The Lucky Ones
by psych21
Summary: COMPLETED! This is my version of what could have happened to Carter and Lucy after that fateful Valentine's Day. It is a Carcy story.
1. Getting Out of Bed

Disclaimer: I don't pretend for a second to own any of these characters, so please don't sue me!

Author's Note: I know I'm kinda living in the past, but I'm still bitter about Lucy's character being killed off. So after deciding that there really wasn't enough Carter/Lucy fan fic out there, I decided to try my hand at it. I've written other fan fic before, but not for ER, so please be kind and feel free to leave feedback!

The Lucky Ones

Chapter One

_"People are crazy, times are strange  
I'm locked in tight, I'm out of range  
I used to care, but things have changed."_

Carter laid his head back on the pillow and closed his eyes, only to be bombarded by the haunting images of Lucy lying on the floor, bleeding profusely. He was only a few feet away from her, but the stab wound in his back made it impossible for him to reach out and help her. He whispers her name and sees her eyes close. Carter woke up startled, frantically looking around his hospital room as he got re-oriented to his surroundings. 'It was just a dream. It didn't happen again.' He reminded himself as he wiped the sweat from his forehead. He took a deep breath to relax, even though it sent pain throughout his entire body. His thoughts went back to Lucy. She was just trying to do her job well and be a good med student that day. As her teacher, he should've protected her, listened to her, and believed her. He knew that she thought Paul Sobricki had a mental problem, and he knew that the psych consult she had ordered was delayed. He should have kept a closer eye on her and known that she was in danger. There were a million things that he should've done differently. Maybe then she wouldn't be in a coma right now. Maybe then she would be laughing or smiling...or even annoying him with her endless talking. Hearing the door open, he didn't even bother looking to see who it was. It wasn't Lucy, so he didn't really care.

Peter entered the room and took a good look at his friend and former med student. He was doing well physically; his back was starting to heal nicely and with some physical therapy, he'd be walking in a few weeks. But emotionally, he was still a wreck. It had only been two weeks since Paul Sobricki had attacked Lucy and Carter and Peter could only imagine what Carter was going through. He knew Carter well enough to know that he was blaming himself for what happened to Lucy. But Carter wouldn't talk about it with anyone. He just sat in his hospital bed all day, staring out the window and refusing to get any physical therapy. "How are you doing today?" he asked, even though he knew the response he would get. Carter would never answer his question. He would always ask about Lucy instead.

On cue, Carter said, "How's Lucy?"

"She's stable. Still in a coma, but she's able to breathe on her own now." Peter was glad to be able to give him some encouraging news.

Carter just nodded. He knew that Lucy was a fighter; she had to be in order to survive the attack. He had gotten off easy with just one stab wound to the back. He'd be as good as new after some physical therapy. But Lucy, well she was stabbed twice in the stomach and twice in the chest. It would take a lot more work for her to be ok. Suddenly, he remembered Peter was still in the room. "Anything else?" he asked, annoyed. Right now, he just wanted to be alone with his thoughts.

"Maybe you should go see her..."

"No." he refused.

"I really think that she'd like it if you'd visit her..."

"I said no!" Carter yelled. He couldn't go in and visit her...not now. He felt too guilty. He just wished she would wake up and be ok. Maybe then some of the guilt he had would go away.

"Well how about you talk to someone? Everyone is getting worried about you..."

Carter interrupted him again. "No. I don't need to talk to anyone. What I need is for Lucy to wake up and be ok!" he yelled. "Now please get out."

Peter was about to protest, but his pager went off. He was needed in the ER. "Ok, I'll leave. But I'll be back."

"Whatever." Carter replied, going back to staring out the window.

* * *

A couple of days later, Peter came back into Carter's room. He found him still staring out the window, and knew that something had to be done before Carter dove deeper into depression. After thinking about it for a while, he had a pretty good idea of how to Carter out of his depression. "Hey Carter. How are you doing?" Peter asked with a smile on his face.

Carter looked at Peter's smile and rolled his eyes. "How's Lucy?" he asked.

"She's the same." Peter replied, sitting in the chair next to Carter's bed. "So, you were supposed to start physical therapy yesterday. Why didn't you?"

"I didn't feel like it." Carter replied harshly.

"So you want to be in a wheelchair for the rest of your life?" Peter asked.

"Why not?" Carter replied casually.

"Well what's Lucy gonna think when she wakes up and sees that you're in a wheelchair voluntarily? She's not gonna be happy when she finds out that you're in a wheelchair just because you didn't feel like putting any effort into walking again." Peter waited for a moment before continuing. "Look man, the truth is, I don't know what you're going through. No one but Lucy comes close to understanding what you're going through. But Lucy isn't available right now; her body is more focused on healing while she sleeps. However, when she wakes up, she's gonna be depending on you. She's gonna look at the progress that you've made and use you as a model. What do you want her to see when she wakes up? A guy who sits in his room and stares out the window all day? A guy who refuses to go to physical therapy and correct a problem just because he doesn't feel like it? Or do you want her to see the John Carter that she's known for over a year? The John Carter that doesn't give up. Carter you're stronger than this. If you work hard, you could be walking in two or three weeks. But that's not gonna happen if you sit around and mope all the time. So what's it going to be? You gonna stay here or do you want me to take you to physical therapy?"

Carter thought about what Peter was saying to him. As much as he hated to admit it, maybe Peter had a point. Maybe he shouldn't be focusing on his guilt, but instead be trying to get better. Because when Lucy woke up, she would need him. She would need to see that he was doing ok so that she would know that she could be ok. He looked at his one-time teacher. "Can you take me to physical therapy?" he asked softly.

"I'd be glad to." Peter smiled.

* * *

Almost two months later, Carter was walking into a meeting with Dr. Weaver and Dr. Romano. After some physical therapy, he had started walking again and was released from the hospital. Now he was meeting with them to see if he could come back to work soon. Lucy still hadn't woken up, and even though he had many opportunities to visit her, he just couldn't do it. "Hello." He greeted as he entered Romano's office and saw Kerry and Romano looking at him.

"Hello Dr. Carter." Romano greeted back. "Please sit."

Carter did was he was told. "So have you made a decision about when I can come back to work?"

"Actually, we have." Kerry replied, looking at Romano.

"You appear to be doing very well in your physical therapy." Romano said, looking over Carter's chart.

"It's going very well. I'm..."

"However, we're still a little concerned about your mental state." Romano interrupted.

"What do you mean?" Carter asked, masking the anger that was coming to the surface.

"We're just not sure that coming back to work so soon is such a good idea." Romano explained. "You've refused earlier attempts of therapy..."

Carter interrupted him. "Because I don't need it. I'm fine. I'm more than ready to come back to work."

"Carter, if you'll let me finish, I was going to tell you that we're going to let you come back to work. But only for five-hour shifts at a time and you won't be allowed to work on trauma cases. We'll re-evaluate your case in six weeks. But we also encourage you to get some counseling." Kerry explained.

"Thank you." Carter replied. He wasn't too happy that they were placing so many conditions on his return, but he knew he had no other choice than to accept it.

"We'll call you about when your first shift back will be." Romano nodded.

"Great." Carter said, leaving the room.

"Do you think it was a good idea letting him come back to work so soon?" Romano asked after Carter was gone.

"I think he'll be ok once Lucy wakes up." Kerry told him.

"Yeah, but who knows when that will be." Romano sighed. "Poor girl. She's gonna have a hard recovery ahead of her when she wakes up."

"Careful Robert, your caring side is showing." Kerry laughed as she left his office.

_Song Lyrics: "Things Have Changed" Bob Dylan_


	2. Waking Up

* * *

The Lucky Ones

Chapter Two

About a week later, it was Carter's first day back to work. He was extremely nervous, and for a moment considered calling Kerry and telling her that he wasn't ready to come back yet. But then he realized that he needed to get back to work. He had missed it too much to stay away. Before he went to the ER though, he knew that he had another stop that he needed to make. It was a stop that was long overdue. After a short elevator ride and going down a long hallway, he came upon his destination. Lucy Knight. That was the name on the door. She had finally been moved out of intensive care and into a private room about two weeks ago. He hesitated when his hand touched the doorknob, but soon realized that he had to see her. He had stayed away too long already and couldn't avoid her forever. Upon entering the room, he saw numerous flower arrangements and balloons filling the empty spaces around her bed. 'They must be from her family and friends.' He hypothesized. Suddenly, he felt really guilty for not sending something to fill her room. He could have at least sent flowers. Then he looked at her. She was lying in the bed, hooked up to multiple machines, but at least she looked peaceful. She looked a lot better than the last time he saw her, lying in a pool of her own blood on the tile of that exam room. Dragging a nearby chair to her bedside, he sat down and grabbed her right hand. He sat there, holding her hand and staring at her face for a long time before he decided to speak. "I'm so sorry Luce. I shouldn't have let this happen to you. I should be the one laying in that bed right now. Not You. I'm also sorry that I haven't come by to see you either. Believe me, I wanted to. But I was afraid. I'm still afraid, but I needed to see you. I needed you to know how sorry I am—how sorry I'll always be for what's happened. I wasn't a very good teacher to you, or a good friend. I yelled at you all the time, and I never listened to you. I pushed you away when you tried to be a friend...and I never told you how I really felt about you after what happened in exam six." He paused. "I'm going back to work today for the first time since...well, you know. And I'm really scared about it. But that's not why I came here. What I came to tell you today is that you really need to wake up now. I miss you Luce, and I know that your family and friends miss you too. I think you've been sleeping for too long. You're ready to wake up and take your life back because you're strong. You can do it. So please come back to everyone who loves back to me." He kissed her hand and then her cheek. He took one last look at her before leaving to go to work so that he wouldn't be late.

As soon as Carter was gone, Lucy started to stir. Slowly, she opened her eyes and got re-adjusted to the bright lights. She had heard someone's voice as she started to regain consciousness. For a moment, she could have sworn that it was Carter's voice. "Carter?" she whispered to the now-empty room.

* * *

Carter meanwhile was getting reoriented back in the ER. After everyone greeted him, he took on his first patient. It was just a simple suture, something that in the past he would have made Lucy do, but he had no problem with that right now. He was just glad to be back. About two hours into his shift, he walked towards the front desk to drop off a chart. As soon as Jerry, Deb, Randi, and Chuni saw him approach, they got very quiet. He noticed this and was curious. "What's up? Why are you all being so quiet?"

They all looked at each other, trying to figure out who would be the one to tell him. Finally, Deb decided that she would. "Carter...it's Lucy...she's..."

Right after he heard that it had something to do with Lucy, he ran over to the elevator and pressed the up button. After waiting for a few seconds, he decided that it would be faster to just run up the six flights of stairs to her room. As he was running the only thought that entered his mind was 'She's dead. Oh God, she's dead.' He finally got to her floor and burst into her room, knocking over a small table that was sitting next to the door. He expected to see that Lucy was dead. But instead, he saw that she was awake and sitting up in her bed while Elizabeth was taking her vitals. He desperately tried to catch his breath and noticed that Elizabeth was trying to contain her laughter over his entrance. Lucy, on the other hand, wasn't containing her laughter.

Lucy had to admit that the way Carter burst into the room was pretty funny. So she started laughing, only to find out that laughing really hurt, so she quickly stopped. "Ow." She winced, looking up at Elizabeth.

Elizabeth touched Lucy's shoulder. "Don't worry Lucy, laughing will hurt for awhile, but only until your muscles get stronger again. Then the pain will go away."

"Thanks." Lucy replied, noticing that Carter was still staring at her.

"I'll be back to check on you later Lucy. And...welcome back." Elizabeth smiled as she left the room.

That left Carter and Lucy alone in the room. Carter just stared at her, unable to believe that she was actually awake, and laughing. He wanted to go to her, but he was frozen where he stood. He had been so sure that Deb was going to tell him that Lucy was dead, but he realized that he should've listened to everything Deb was saying before running off.

Lucy couldn't take any more silence. "Hello Carter." She smiled weakly.

Her weak smile and greeting warmed his heard and he walked over to the side of her bed. "God Luce, you don't know how good it is to hear your voice again. I've missed you so much."

"Well it's good to actually be awake." Lucy replied. "I can't believe I've been out of it for so long."

Carter wasn't sure what to say next. He had so many questions, so many things that he wanted to tell her. But it didn't seem like the right time. He noticed that a piece of her hair had fallen into her face and gently pulled it away from her face again as they sat in silence.

* * *

Back in the ER, Kerry approached the front desk. "Anyone seen Carter lately?" she asked.

"He ran up to see Lucy. She's awake." Jerry informed her. "Do you want me to page him?"

Kerry smiled. "No. Let him spend some time with her."

* * *

"So, you're starting your first day back today?" Lucy asked after a round of silence.

"Yeah. How'd you know?" Carter asked.

"I heard what you said this morning when I was waking up. Well, I heard bits and pieces of it." She admitted.

"I didn't think I'd ever get to see you again." He smiled.

"How are you doing? How bad was it for you?" she whispered.

The smile that was on his face immediately fell as he heard her question. How was he supposed to tell her that he was basically fine after a few weeks of physical therapy, whereas she's been in a coma all this time? "It's been rough I guess. Physical therapy wasn't much fun. But now that you're awake, things are looking a lot better."

She noted his reaction to her question. "C'mon Carter! I've been out of it for almost two months and all you can say is that physical therapy wasn't fun? What's been going on with you?" she prodded.

"I don't know what to tell you. I had physical therapy and that was it. There's not that much to tell." He didn't mean to, but the tone of his voice sounded angry.

"Ok." Lucy relented. She recognized that tone of voice of his. It usually meant that she was annoying him and that she should move to another topic.

"So, you're looking good considering..."

"Thanks." Lucy replied softly.

He could tell that he had upset her by the tone he had used with her. "I should probably get back to work before they worry." He didn't want to leave her; he never wanted to leave her side again, but he had to. "I'll let you get some rest."

"Ok." She replied. She didn't want him to go. She wanted to tell him so many things, and ask him so many questions. But he didn't seem like he wanted to talk about what had happened to them. So she decided not to bring the topic up again.

* * *

When Carter stepped off the elevator to go back to the ER, he found Weaver. "Sorry I was gone so long..."

"Don't worry about it Carter. I half expected you to stay up there with Lucy longer. How is she doing?" Kerry asked.

Then it hit him. He hadn't once asked her how she was doing. He felt like a complete jerk. "Well, I think she's just trying to adjust to being awake again."

"Yeah. I thought I'd go up and see her later." Weaver smiled. "We were really lucky that we didn't lose either of you that night."

Carter nodded as Weaver went away to yell at Dave.

* * *

Lucy was lost in her thoughts when she heard someone knock on the door. She was surprised to see that it was Dr. Romano. "Hello Dr. Romano." She smiled.

"Hello Miss Knight. How are you feeling?" he asked.

"I've been better, but I've been a lot worse also." She smiled.

"Well you definitely look wonderful." He smiled.

"Elizabeth told me about what you did for me. Thank you. I probably wouldn't be here right now if you hadn't...'

"No need to thank me Miss Knight. I'm just glad to see you awake." He interrupted her, not wanting to hear her thank him. He didn't like mushy scenes and went to great lengths to avoid them. "Well I have to go do a surgery. I just wanted to stop in and say welcome back."

"Thanks." Lucy replied. She didn't have any time to reflect on Romano's visit because it was only a matter of seconds before there was another knock on her door.

"Hey there. Feel up to a visit from Dr. Dave?" Dave asked with a huge smile on his face.

"Sure." Lucy smiled. "How have you been?"

"Me? Ah you know, just the same old, same old. Date after date after date, and still haven't found anyone I like." Dave joked.

Lucy chuckled. "Well don't worry. There's gotta be a girl out there who can win the heart of Dr. Dave."

"I hope so." Dave laughed. "So, we were all pretty worried about you."

"That's what everyone keeps saying. It seems like everyone I've ever known in this hospital has come to visit today."

"Well then I'm glad I came by." He told her, a huge smile forming on his face. "I would hate to be the one person you know who didn't visit you." He laughed. Then he got serious again. "The ER hasn't been the same without you."

"It's only a matter of time until I'm back." Lucy replied, not sure if she was re-assuring him or herself.

"Glad to hear that. Listen, I gotta get back to work before Weaver finds out I took an extended break. She's already yelled at me twice today. I don't want her to yell at me again."

"Thanks for coming!" she called out to him as he left.

After he left, she sat back down in her bed and the smile fell from her face. She started to replay the day's events. She had started the day in a coma and now she couldn't close her eyes for a minute. Every time she closed them, someone from the ER would come and visit her. And she did really appreciate that they would come and see her, but they all gave her the exact same look. It was the look of pure pity. They all pitied her; she could see it in their faces—even Romano and especially Carter. He was the worse one of them all. He gave her this look of pity and guilt mixed together. The only person who hadn't acted different around her or given her looks of pity was Dave. She didn't want their pity. She didn't need their pity. She was going to be just fine. She'd go through physical therapy, come back to work, and still graduate to become a doctor like she had planned. She wouldn't let this hold her back. This whole bad episode would be nothing but a hiatus for her. She'd be fine, right? Her thoughts went back to Carter. As much as she hated the pity and guilt that he gave her, she was just so glad that he was alive. If he had died and she had lived...well, she wouldn't have been able to live with herself. But they were both alive and she guessed that she was supposed to feel lucky. So why didn't she?

Carter stood outside Lucy's room, watching her through the window. Fortunately, she hadn't noticed that he was staring at her again. He could tell that she didn't like it, but he couldn't help it. He was just so happy that she was alive. Finally, he got up the courage to go inside. "Hey." He greeted.

"Hey." Lucy smiled.

"I brought you something." He said, pulling an object out from behind his back and handing it to her.

"You didn't have to." Lucy protested as she took the object.

"I know, but I wanted to." He told her. "Just think of it as my apology for snapping at you earlier."

"Well don't worry about it. I know that old habits die hard." She replied. 'There's that look of pity and guilt again.' "Thank you." She smiled, clutching the small teddy bear close to her heart.

"So how are you doing?" he asked, sitting next to her bed.

"Fine. I'm fine." She replied for what seemed like the millionth time that day. "I would like to get out of this bed soon, but Elizabeth says that won't be possible for awhile."

"It's probably for the best. You've been through a lot." He smiled.

She nodded, and decided to change the topic. She was tired of talking about herself all day. "So how was your first day back?"

"It was weird. You'll understand when you come back. I'm stuck with five-hour shifts and can't take any trauma cases. But it's only temporary."

"So is Chuni spreading around any interesting gossip?"

Carter laughed. "I thought you hated her gossiping!"

"I do, but I feel completely out of the loop about what's going on in everyone's lives." Lucy explained.

"Well, let me tell you what I've found out today..." he started.


	3. First Big Fight

The Lucky Ones

Chapter Three

A Couple of Months Later

October 14th, exactly eight months after the Sobricki incident, was when Lucy was finally able to go back to work. She had gone through some intensive physical therapy, and was starting to feel more like herself again. But she was still battling certain demons. She had formed a semi-close friendship with Carter, but they never talked about what had happened to them that night. As much as she wanted to lean on him for support and talk about what had happened to them, she decided against it. He didn't seem to want to talk about it, so they never brought that topic up. As she stood outside the hospital entrance, she realized that she was more nervous now than she was on her first day. 'Here goes nothing.' She thought as she went inside.

"Lucy! It's great to see you!" Jerry exclaimed from behind the desk.

"Hi Jerry. Where's Dr. Greene? He asked me to find him when I got here."

"He's in the lounge. And welcome back. This place hasn't been the same since you've been gone." He smiled.

"Thanks." Lucy smiled as she approached the lounge. She went into the lounge and saw that Mark was talking to Carter. "Excuse me Dr. Greene, I hate to interrupt but..."

"Lucy! Great timing. I was just telling Carter that I've assigned him to be your teacher again. Is that ok?" Mark asked with a smile.

"That's fine." She agreed.

"Good. We've saved your locker for you." Mark informed her.

"Thanks." Lucy smiled, as Mark was paged and left the room. She went over to her locker and used her old combination. Inside, she found that everything was exactly how she had left it before--except there was a new lab coat and stethoscope for her.

"Are you ready?" Carter asked.

"Of course." She replied, following him out of the lounge.

"I thought that today maybe you could help me catch up on some paperwork." He told her. "You know, just to get used to the ER again."

Lucy sighed. She knew what he was doing. He was treating her like she was the most fragile person in the world. She was ready to treat patients, but she knew that arguing with him wouldn't do any good. "Fine." She replied in the happiest voice she could muster.

* * *

After a non-eventful day of doing chart work, Lucy grabbed her keys and slammed her locker shut.

"Whoa! What did the locker do to make you hate it so much?" Dave asked as he poured himself a cup of coffee.

"Nothing. It's not the locker that I'm mad at." Lucy replied. She took a step closer to Dave. He was the only one in the ER that didn't treat her like she was extremely fragile or different. They had grown closer as friends over the past couple of months.

"Then who are you mad at?" he asked curiously.

"I'll give you three guesses and a hint. His name rhymes with barter."

Dave laughed. "Carter huh? What did he do?"

"Assigned me to do chart work all day! Do you know how boring that is?" she complained, shaking her head.

"I've had to do it before. Weaver's assigned me to it as punishment before." He sympathized. "It is boring."

"Can I ask you something?"

"Sure. What's up?" Dave asked, turning to face her.

"Never mind." She shrugged.

"What? You need help solving a problem? Well I can help. I'm great at solving problems. I'm a regular Dear Abby!" he protested, happy to hear her laugh. "You know what your problem is?"

"I haven't even told you my problem yet."

"True. But nine times out of ten, problems can be solved by re-introducing fun into your life." He informed her. He noticed she looked skeptical. "Ok. You don't buy into my theory, do you?"

"I just don't see how fun is supposed to help solve all of my problems." She crossed her arms around her chest.

"Well it doesn't solve all problems, but it solves some of them. Think about it. When was the last time that you had fun? And I'm talking about the kind of fun where you completely forget about everything that's bothering you and you are completely relaxed."

"I...I don't know. I don't remember." She lied. The real answer was when she was with Carter in exam six. But she definitely couldn't tell Dave that. And it seemed like another lifetime ago.

"See! That's your problem. You desperately need more fun in your life." Dave exclaimed.

"Ok. So how do I get the fun back into my life?"

"Well, see, that's the thing." Dave replied. "It's a complicated process. The first step is to go see a movie with me tonight. I know the perfect one to see. It's supposed to be hilarious."

"Is this just an excuse to go on a date with me?" Lucy asked suspiciously.

"No. You need a fun coach, and I'm offering my services since I am the king of fun. Trust me Lucy. This is not a romantic thing. This is just one friend helping out another friend. We are friends, right?"

"Of course. I'm sorry. I just had to make sure that it wasn't a date." Lucy blushed.

"It's no problem. It's not that I don't think I would enjoy dating you, but you're not really my type. I usually go for girls who aren't nearly as smart as you, and have absolutely no morals." He told her with a huge smile on his face.

Lucy laughed. "I see. Well maybe that's why you haven't found anyone you really like." She pointed out.

"Maybe." He shrugged. "So what about it? Wanna go to the movies with me tonight?" he asked again.

"Sure. Why not?" She didn't really see any reason why she shouldn't go ahead and go to the movies with Dave since it wasn't a real date. Maybe while she was seeing the movie she could forget about how Carter was annoying her.

"Ok. I get off at 7, so I'll pick you up at 8?"

"Sounds great. Thanks Dave." She smiled as she left.

* * *

Pretty soon, Halloween had arrived. Lucy was a little happier, partially because she had a good time with Dave at the movies. They had gone out to dinner over the weekend and also had gone bowling. She really enjoyed hanging out with him. But Carter was still annoying her. He had finally let her do sutures and other menial tasks, but insisted on looking over her shoulder throughout the entire process. He wouldn't leave her alone with a patient—even children. She knew it was because he felt guilty about what happened with Sobricki, but she wanted him to get over it. She didn't want him to watch every move she made. She felt like he didn't trust her to do even the simplest things. The only time she could be by herself during her shift was when she went to the restroom. He was being worse to her now than when she was first here. He was always nice to her, and never raised his voice—even when she made mistakes. It was spooky and she didn't like it. She wanted him to act normal around her. She wanted him to yell at her or something. Anything to make things go back to the way they were before. She had just finished putting a cast on an eight-year-olds arm. They were walking back to the front desk.

"So there's a rumor going around that you and Dave are seeing a lot of each other." Carter mentioned. He didn't want it to be true.

"Yeah? Well it's true." Lucy replied. "He's helping me re-introduce fun into my life."

"You're letting Malucci help you?"

"Yeah, what's wrong with that?" Lucy asked.

"Nothing I guess." He shrugged. "It's just that Malucci never really does anything to help anyone other than himself."

"I guess you don't know him as well as you think you do. He's been a good friend to me."

"Well maybe, but it's probably only so that he can get you into bed." Carter closed his eyes tightly after he said that statement. He honestly hadn't meant to say that out loud, and instantly regretted it.

Chuni stood behind the front desk with Deb. "Looks like they're about ready to fight." Chuni whispered to Deb.

"Yeah. I guess things are finally getting back to normal again." Deb whispered back.

Lucy was getting very mad. "Why is it so hard to believe that Dave can be a true friend to me? Don't you think that I'd be able to tell if he was trying to use me?"

"Yes of course you could. I'm sorry. I honestly don't know why I said that." He apologized.

"You know, you could use a little fun in your life too." She pointed out.

"I have fun." Carter protested, even though it wasn't really true.

"No you don't!" Lucy laughed, calling him on his lie. "But maybe if you had some fun in your life you wouldn't feel the need to have me perma-glued to your side." Lucy said, walking off.

But Carter walked after her. "What is that supposed to mean?" he asked, causing her to turn around.

"Ever since you've let me start seeing patients again, you're always right there! You're always looking over my shoulder and you never leave me alone! I have to go the restroom to get away from you!" Lucy yelled.

"Well I didn't know that you hated being around me so much!" Carter yelled.

"It's not that and you should know that by now! It's just that you're different now." Lucy pointed out.

"Oh I'm different now? How?"

"You treat me like a china doll that's just gonna break if you aren't there every single moment holding my hand through everything! You won't leave me alone with anyone!"

"That's because the last time I left you alone with a patient, you ended up in a coma for two months!" Carter yelled back.

His statement hurt her, but she didn't want to let him see that. "I don't need you to constantly look out for me."

Couldn't she see that he was just trying to protect her? "Yeah, because you've done such a good job of looking out for yourself in the past." He said sarcastically. As soon as he said it, he regretted it. "Luce..." But Lucy had already run off. He looked around and saw that everyone in the ER was looking at him. "Show's over people. Go back to work." He yelled before grabbing a chart. He wanted to go after her and apologize, but figured that they needed some time apart right now.

Lucy ran through the halls of the ER, trying desperately not to cry. She couldn't believe that he would bring up the Sobricki incident like that. She wasn't watching where she was going and ran into someone. "Sor..." she saw it was Dave. "Oh, hi."

"What's wrong?" he asked. He could tell that she was two seconds away form crying.

"Fight with Carter." She rolled her eyes.

"Oh." He put his arm around her shoulder. "You ok?"

"I will be." Lucy nodded her head.

"I hear that there's a small Halloween party later over at Doc Magoo's. Wanna come with me--as friends? Maybe you just need to have some fun."

"Sure." Lucy replied, trying to put a smile back on her face.


	4. Confessions

The Lucky Ones

Chapter Four

_When I counted up my demons.  
Saw there was one for everyday,  
With the good ones on my shoulders,  
I drove the other ones away._

_So if you ever feel neglected,  
If you think that all is lost,  
I'll be counting up my demons, yeah,  
Hoping everything's not lost._

Lucy managed to avoid Carter for the rest of her shift by shadowing Dr. Greene instead. He had heard their earlier fight and thought that it would be best for everyone if she and Carter were apart for a while. After her shift she then hung out at Doc Magoos until Dave was off.

"Are you sure that you want to come to a party right now?" Dave asked her when he got there after he noticed that she still looked a little upset.

"I'm sure. I need some fun STAT." She laughed.

Dave laughed. The party had started and people were getting drinks and dancing. They each got a beer and sat down with Chuni, Jerry, and Deb. "Happy Halloween guys." He toasted.

About an hour had passed, and Lucy was having a pretty good time until she saw Carter start to approach the table. She turned to Dave. "Wanna dance?" she asked, wanting to get far away from Carter.

"Uh, sure." He shrugged.

They got up and started to dance, leaving Carter there. He had only come because Dave had told him that Lucy would be there. He really wanted to talk to her so that he could apologize for the things he had said to her.

"So Carter, I guess you could only wait a couple of weeks before fighting with Lucy again?" Chuni asked.

"Yeah. Excuse me." He went up and got a beer, all the while, watching Lucy and Dave dance. He couldn't help but feel jealous, even though he was trying to suppress every inappropriate feeling he had for Lucy.

Meanwhile, Dave was trying to get Lucy to confide in him as they were dancing. "So what was the fight about?" he prodded.

"Just the same old, same old. He won't leave me alone when I'm with a patient. He just stands there, watching every single move I make. And he doesn't yell at me anymore—well except when I goaded him into the argument today." She explained.

"So you're mad because he cares about you and wants to protect you? And he doesn't yell at you anymore?" he deduced.

"Yeah, but it's more complicated than that." She insisted.

"These things usually are." Dave smiled.

"And what's that supposed to mean?" Lucy asked, referring to the goofy smile on Dave's face.

"Lucy, it's so obvious to me and pretty much everyone else in the hospital that you and Carter have feelings for each other."

Lucy laughed. "What? I do not! And neither does he!" she denied, even though Dave was completely right about her feelings. She did have feelings for him, but it didn't matter.

"Sure. Deny it. Maybe it will just go away." He replied sarcastically.

"You're wrong! He's my teacher! And...and he's Carter!" she stammered.

"But there's no stopping love."

"Love? Who said anything about love? I do not love him." She protested.

"Me thinks the lady doth protest too much." He replied in his best Shakespeare impression.

"Well I don't want to talk about Carter. I don't want to even think about Carter. This conversation is over. Next topic please!" Lucy insisted, even though Carter was usually all that she thought about.

Carter went back to the group's table and overheard Chuni talking.

"You know, Dave and Lucy would make a cute couple." Chuni commented as she took another look at them dancing.

"Yeah, they would." Deb echoed.

"I don't think so." Carter told them, taking a big gulp of his beer.

"Oh yeah? Why not?" Chuni asked, suspicious.

"Because Dave's not good enough for Lucy." Carter explained.

"And what? You are?" Chuni asked, hoping for some juicy gossip.

Carter looked at her strangely. "What are you talking about?"

"C'mon Carter! We all know that you and Lucy have feelings for each other and we all remember what happened in exam six." Chuni explained.

"Nothing happened then!" Carter denied.

"Sure...whatever you say." Chuni patronized him. "But I know what I saw."

"Lucy sure looks like she's having a good time though." Deb told him.

He saw her laugh as she danced with Dave, and got severely jealous. He had to do something. Getting up, he walked over to where they were dancing. "Can I cut in?" he asked.

They stopped dancing. "It's up to Lucy." Dave finally said.

"Then no." Lucy replied, not even looking at Carter.

"Please? I need to talk to you." Carter pleaded.

"You know what Lucy? I'm getting thirsty. I'm gonna get something to drink." Dave told her, letting them talk because he thought that's what they both needed right now.

"Traitor." She whispered. She stood out in the middle of the dance floor with Carter—neither of them moving to the beat of the song. "What do you want?"

"I want to apologize. I didn't mean what I said to you earlier."

She rolled her eyes. "Fine. Apology accepted. Are we done talking now?" Lucy asked.

"Nope. We still need to talk."

"About what?" she asked, getting impatient.

"About what happened that night." He replied.

"You want to talk about that now? Here?" she asked, her voice rising.

"Yes...well not here. We could go somewhere and talk. But I think we need to get everything out in the open or else we're just going to continue to fight all the time."

"No. I don't want to talk to you." She yelled.

"Lucy, talk to me! Please?" Carter pleaded.

Lucy looked around Doc Magoo's and saw all of their friends and co-workers staring at them with interest. "Ok, fine." She said, turning to face Carter again. "You want me to talk about that night? I'll talk. But what do you want to know about first? The nightmares that come every single time I close my eyes? The hundred or so reasons I cry myself to sleep every night? Ooh! I know! Why don't we talk about the huge loads of guilt that I feel about you being attacked too? Or how I wonder at least ten times a day why the hell I didn't die that night. Tell me, what would you like to talk about first Carter?" Tears were forming in her eyes and she did nothing to stop them as they cascaded down her cheeks. Carter tried to wipe them away, but she pulled back out of his reach. Unable to look him in the eyes anymore, she ran out of Doc Magoo's.

Carter watched her go and knew that he had to go after her. 'But what will I say to her? What can I say to her? I had no idea that she was in that much pain.' He quickly ran out after her, calling out her name. But that only made her run faster. Her apartment wasn't too far from the hospital and she made it there before him. By the time he caught up with her, she had already locked her door. "Lucy! Lucy come on! Let me in! Please?"

"Go away!" Lucy shouted as she sat on her couch.

"Luce! Please let me in!" Carter pounded.

"No! I don't want to talk to you. I don't want to talk to anyone."

"Lucy, I'm giving you to the count of three..."

"And then you'll what? Break my door down?" Lucy shouted, getting up from the couch and crossing her arms around her chest.

"One...Two................Three! Ok, I warned you!" Carter yelled. He pulled out his driver's license and used it to pry open the lock.

"I can have you arrested for that." Lucy shook her head angrily at her uninvited guest.

"But we both know you won't." Carter said as he took a good look at her. She hadn't stopped crying completely and she looked like she was about to fall apart again. "I'm just really worried about you."

"I'm fine." Lucy lied as she went back to sitting on the couch.

"You're not fine."

"Are you some kind of psychologist now?" she asked angrily.

"No, hardly." He chuckled. "Look, we have been talking about anything and everything but what happened that night. I think it's time we talked about it and got everything out in the open." There was a short silence, and he sat down on the couch next to her. "I didn't know that you were in so much pain."

"You never asked. You never seemed like you would care about it. I asked you in the hospital after I woke up about what happened to you, and you got mad at me. I figured that you just wanted to pretend it didn't happen." She explained. "So that's what I did."

"I'm sorry about that. I didn't mean to make you think that. I just didn't want you to know that my recovery was so easy when yours wouldn't be."

Lucy looked at the floor. "So did you have...were you in a lot of pain?"

He looked at her closely. Why hadn't he seen it before? She was also feeling guilty. Maybe he was just so wrapped up in his own guilt that he missed seeing the signs of her guilt. "There was pain...but most of it was emotional pain."

She looked up at him with confusion circling her eyes. "What's that mean?"

"When I found out that you were in a coma, I completely shut down. No one really knew how to reach me. Dr. Benton finally came in and had a long talk with me. He said that you would wake up when your body was refreshed enough, and that I should think about what I wanted you to wake up to. I was pretty bad off at that time, and I didn't want you to see me like that. So I did physical therapy and I waited for you to wake up. When you did wake up, I swore to myself that I wouldn't let anything else happen to you under my watch. That's why I've had you perma-glued to my side around patients."

"But it's not your job to be my bodyguard." She pointed out softly.

"Maybe not, but having you close by makes me feel better. I'm sorry that I didn't take into account your feelings."

His apology made Lucy feel bad. She knew that he was just trying to protect her, but she didn't want it. "I think it's nice that you want to look out for me, but it's really not necessary."

"But if I had just paid attention to you..."

"I don't blame you for what happened." She interrupted. She put her head in her hands. "If anyone here should be blamed, it should be me. You shouldn't have been attacked. I knew that you had entered the room. I could smell your cologne and I recognized your shoes. I tried to warn you, I really did. I just couldn't get any words out. But I should've..." ..." She started to cry again. "I'm so sorry."

Before she could finish that sentence, Carter had enveloped her into a tight hug and held her as she cried. "Shh, it's ok Luce." They sat there, huddled together for what seemed like hours. Lucy had finally calmed down and he wiped the leftover tears from her face. "You don't have to be sorry about anything. Especially not about what happened to me. It wasn't your fault. If it was anyone's fault, it was mine. I was your teacher. I should've paid more attention to you. But I was too caught up in trying to avoid you to be a good teacher."

She pulled away from his embrace. "Avoiding me?" She asked, looking at him strangely and chuckling. For the first time since their argument earlier in the day she genuinely smiled. "Why? Am I really that annoying?"

"I think that this is a conversation for another time." Carter shook his head.

"No. You said you wanted to get things out in the open. So why? Why were you trying to avoid me? Did I do something to make you mad at me?"

"No. I was more mad at myself than you." He finally replied, wishing she wouldn't make him tell her.

"Because?" Lucy prodded.

"I really don't think that now is the right time to have this discussion." He shook his head again.

"Well too bad. Why were you avoiding me?"

"Because I was in love with you and the only way I could deal with it was to avoid you!" He blurted out, immediately thinking that it was the wrong thing to say. He looked at Lucy and saw the look of shock on her face. He put his head in his hands and sighed. He knew he should've kept his big mouth shut.

"You...you fell in love with me?" she stammered, shocked by his admission. "But you've always treated me like you couldn't stand to be around me."

"Yeah, I know I did. I just...Look, I don't think this is what we should be talking about."

"But I think it's kinda important." Lucy protested. She had to admit, that she was beyond shocked that he admitted to having such strong feelings for her. The prospect of him loving her certainly did make her stomach do about a million flip-flops.

"Not as important as what we were talking about before."

"Do you still...you know...love me?" she asked slowly. She had always had romantic feelings for him—especially after what happened in exam six. Her feelings for him were one of the reasons why she felt so guilty for what he had to go through because of her.

"Luce..." he said softly, looking up at her.

"It's a simple question."

He sighed. "Yes." He whispered. He noticed that she looked deep in thought. "Luce, aren't you going to say something? Anything?"

"I don't know what to say." She replied honestly. There was a part of her that secretly celebrated when he said that he still loved her. But there was also a part of her that scolded those feelings. After all, he was still her teacher, and...he was Dr. Carter. She never expected him to actually have feelings for her.

"See this is why we shouldn't have talked about this." Carter pointed out. "Now there's this big, uncomfortable elephant in the room."

She stood up and walked over to the window. "It's probably a good thing that you told me though."

"How so?" he asked. The last thing he wanted to do was get his hopes up and think that she would feel the same way about him. But he couldn't help but hope that there was a chance.

"Well, it's just a good thing to know." Lucy stammered. She wasn't sure what she was going to do now.

"I should probably go now." Carter sighed, getting up and walking to the door. He couldn't believe that he had just blurted out his feelings to Lucy like that. Now he's probably ruined their friendship.

Lucy watched him walk over to the door and felt an urge to stop him. She ran over and slammed her body against the door, blocking Carter from reaching the doorknob.

Carter looked at her like she was an alien who had grown a second head. "What are you doing Lucy?"

"I'm not sure. I just know that I don't want you to go." She replied. She surprised herself with the words that came out of her mouth, but she knew it was true.

"Well I shouldn't stay." He told her. There were about a million reasons why he shouldn't stay, whereas there were really only one or two reasons to stay.

"Probably not." She replied softly, still not moving out of his way. Their eyes remained locked on each other for what seemed like forever before she reached up and softly pressed her lips to his.

The kiss soon deepened, and Carter had his arms wrapped around her waist. The soft kiss that she had initiated was now becoming a smoldering kiss full of passion and heat. He knew that kissing her like this wasn't a smart idea, but he just couldn't seem to pull away.

Lucy wrapped her arms around his neck, savoring the feelings she was experiencing with the kiss. To be honest, she wasn't sure what prompted her to kiss him and she knew that it probably wasn't the best idea in the world. But it was happening, so she was determined to savor it for as long as it lasted.

Carter pulled away from her, ending the kiss, and looked down at the floor. "We shouldn't have done that." He whispered. He knew that Lucy had been upset earlier and the last thing he wanted to do was take advantage of her when she was upset. He couldn't be sure if she really had feelings for him or if she was just caught up in the moment. And they couldn't afford to just get caught up in the moment.

Lucy let her arms fall to her side and also looked down at the floor. Here we go again! I bet he'll give the same speech he gave after the little thing in exam six. She waited to hear his reasons for why they couldn't kiss again.

"I better go." Carter told her with a nervous smile.

"We aren't going to talk about what just happened?" Lucy asked surprised that he wasn't going to lecture her on how it was inappropriate and couldn't happen again.

"Nothing happened Lucy." He shook his head. "I'll see you at work." He leaned against her door after he left, wondering how he could be so insensitive. What was he thinking when he told her that he loved her? Yeah it was true, but that's not something that you are supposed to just blurt out like that—especially when you're having such a serious conversation.

After he left her apartment, she leaned her head on the door, trying to figure out what had just happened. First he said he loved her, then she kissed him, and now he's saying that nothing happened? She couldn't figure out what kind of a game he was playing, but she didn't really appreciate it.

_Song Lyric: "Everything's Not Lost" by Coldplay_

**Author's Note: I'd like to send a big thank you to everyone who has reviewed this story! It really helps to know that people are enjoying this story. So thank you!**


	5. ShadowBoxing

* * *

The Lucky Ones

Chapter Five

_You made me a shadow-boxer, baby  
I wanna be ready for what you do  
I been swinging all around me  
'Cause I don't know when you're  
gonna make your move_

Lucy was the first one to arrive at work the next day. She still wasn't sure what to think about what had happened at her apartment. She couldn't sleep last night; she just kept replaying their conversation and that kiss over and over in her mind. She wasn't sure how it was going to affect their working relationship. Last night Carter seemed determined to act like nothing had happened, so she had decided to also pretend it didn't happen.

"Hi Lucy." Jerry greeted with a smile.

"Hi. I wanted to apologize for last night's little outburst."

He could tell that she was embarrassed about the way she had acted at the party. "Don't worry about it. Everyone here's done it at least once before. You have nothing to worry about." Jerry smiled.

"Thanks." Lucy smiled back and walked to the lounge. On her was inside, she ran into Dr. Greene. "Sorry."

"Lucy. That's ok. I didn't think that you would be in today." Mark said with concern in his voice.

"I'm fine." When she saw that he didn't believe that, she corrected herself. "I'm much better than I was last night. I got a little carried away last night. I'm sorry."

"No need to be sorry. Are you sure that you don't need to take a personal day?"

"I'm sure." She nodded.

"Ok." Mark replied as he left.

Lucy walked over to her locker and opened it. She was getting ready when she heard someone enter the lounge.

Carter walked over to his locker, which was right next to Lucy's. "Hey." He greeted.

"Hey." She greeted back, not looking at him. Instead, she tried to focus on the contents of her locker.

God this is awkward. He looked over at her and cursed himself for telling her about his feelings. It wasn't the right time and now he was afraid that he had just ruined any chance for even a friendship with her. "Can we talk?" he asked.

"About what?" she asked softly.

"What happened last night." He replied.

She finally looked up at him. "You said nothing happened last night. So if nothing happened, then there's no reason for us to talk." Closing her locker, she exited the lounge and ran into Dave.

"Hey, how are you?" Dave asked, concerned about the way she had left Doc Magoos.

"I'm fine." She replied.

"Did you and Carter talk?"

She chuckled. "Yeah; we did. But I don't want to talk about it right now." She rushed off.

After Lucy left, Carter slammed his locker shut and lightly banged his head against it a few times.

Dave entered the lounge and chuckled when he saw Carter beating his head against his locker. "Bad day already?" he joked.

Carter turned around. "You could say that." He started to exit the lounge, but turned around. "Hey Dave, you're pretty close with Lucy, right?"

"Yeah. Why?" Dave asked suspiciously.

"Well, can you tell me..."

"Nope." Dave interrupted, not even wanting to hear the question.

"But I didn't even ask you the question."

"Yeah, but I could tell that you want me to talk to you about Lucy. You probably want me to tell you the inside scoop about what she's thinking. But I won't do it. First of all, I have no idea what she's thinking and second of all, I can tell that she's already kinda mad that I let you cut in last night." He explained.

"Ok." Carter replied sadly. "It was worth a shot though."

* * *

For the rest of the day, Carter let Lucy have some space. He stopped acting like she was supposed to be perma-glued to him, and let her treat patients alone. He didn't want to, but he knew that it was what she wanted. When his shift was over, he didn't really want to go back to his apartment so he went up to the roof to think. He was surprised to find Dave and Lucy up there talking. He knew he shouldn't, but he decided to eavesdrop a little.

"So do you want to talk about what happened last night?" Dave finally asked. They had been sitting on the roof for almost ten minutes and Lucy hadn't said a word. Luckily, his shift was over, so Weaver couldn't yell at him for taking such a long break.

Lucy looked down at the ground. "We talked." She replied, pausing for a moment. "But can you keep a secret?"

"Yeah. Of course." Dave nodded.

"I mean a big secret—a secret that you can't tell anyone for any reason." She clarified.

"Lucy, just spit it out. You know I won't tell your secrets to anyone."

She paused. "He...well...he kinda told me that he loved me." She bit her lip, waiting for whatever reaction he would have.

Dave immediately started laughing. Then he got an angry glare from Lucy and stopped. "I'm sorry. It's not funny."

"You're damn right it isn't funny! Why would you laugh about that?" she asked, getting a little angry.

"Well, if you remember correctly, I told you he had feelings for you. But you didn't want to believe it." He pointed out.

"So you're saying I told you so?" Lucy sighed. "Great."

"So is that the big secret? 'Cause I was actually hoping for something a little more juicy and shocking."

"That's not the whole secret." Lucy shook her head. "I...uh, kinda kissed him."

"On the cheek?" Dave asked.

"No. It was on the lips." She shook her head.

"So then what happened?" he asked with interest.

"He left." She replied angrily. "I don't know what kind of game he's playing here. I mean, first he says that he loves me. Then he runs for the door as soon as I show any kind of interest. It's just like him to do that to me again."

"Again?" Dave asked curiously. Then he figured out what she was talking about. "So something did happen in exam six?"

"Yes." Lucy sighed. "I don't know what to do."

Dave put his arm around her shoulder. "Well, do you love him?" he asked.

"Well I know that right now I don't even really like him very much." She replied with anger.

Carter backed away from where he was standing and quietly closed the door to the roof. He had heard enough. He had no idea that he had hurt Lucy so much when he left last night. He didn't realize that she thought he was playing games with her. He knew that he had some serious thinking to do and left quickly before Dave and Lucy found him eavesdropping.

Meanwhile, on the roof, Lucy looked up and smiled at Dave. "Thanks for listening to me. I appreciate it. I really needed someone to talk to about this."

"Don't worry about it. I've never actually had a close female friend before. It's kinda nice." Dave smiled. "Want to go grab a pizza?"

"No thanks." She replied, looking up at the sky. "It looks like it's about to storm soon. I just want to go home. Maybe I'll read a book or something."

"Ok. Why don't you let me drop you off? I don't want you to have to walk home in rain."

"That would be nice. Thanks." She smiled, leaving the roof with him.

* * *

About two hours later, Lucy was sitting on her couch in her pajamas. She was eating ice cream out of the carton and flipping through the channels of her TV, trying to find something to watch. Hearing a clap of thunder, she was glad that she wasn't out in this horrible storm. She finally decided to watch one of the old movie channels, which was playing "Casablanca".

Meanwhile, in a bar not too far from Lucy's apartment, Carter was sitting with a beer in front of him. He had only drunk about half of it because he wanted to keep a clear head. His thoughts centered on Lucy and the mess he had made of things. He loved her, and he wanted to be with her. So why was he playing games with her? Was it because of the fact that a relationship with her would jeopardize his career and her schooling? Or was he just afraid of getting too close to her and then losing her? A light bulb went off above his head. He needed to talk to her about this new idea that had popped into his head. Laying some money on the bar, he left the safety of the bar and ventured outside. He was rudely awakened by the storm that was going on and cursed himself for not bringing an umbrella. But he knew that Lucy's apartment wasn't too far away and decided just to run there.

Lucy yawned as her eyes focused on the small television screen in front of her. She had already finished off one quart of ice cream and debated about opening up another one. But she decided that two quarts of ice cream in one night was a little excessive. So instead she concentrated on the movie, which was almost over. "I can't believe she leaves Casablanca and Rick. It's not what I would do." She spoke to herself and the empty apartment. Since the movie was over, she got up and stretched. Then she heard an obnoxious pounding on her door. "God, who could that be at this hour?" she whispered, walking over to the door and opening it to find Carter. He was soaking wet and out of breath. "Dr. Carter? What are you doing here?" she asked, surprised to see him there.

He noticed that she called him Dr. Carter. She only did that when she was mad at him. So he guessed that she was still rightfully mad at him. "I was in the neighborhood?" he joked, trying to lighten the mood.

"God you're soaked!" she exclaimed as she looked at him.

"Yeah. I kinda forgot my umbrella. I didn't know it was going to rain." He explained, wondering if she was going to invite him in.

She sighed. "Well come on in. Since you're here, you might as well dry off a little." She motioned for him to come in.

He entered her apartment and stood close to the door. They stood there for a moment in silence.

Lucy went into the closet and pulled out a couple of towels and motioned for him to go into the bathroom. "Here." She said, handing him the towels. "If you want, I can put your wet clothes in the dryer for you. And you can wear my robe while they're drying. It's on the back of the door."

"Thanks." He smiled, entering the bathroom.

"No problem." She replied. She figured that while he was in the bathroom, she would go ahead and make some coffee for him. As she was getting out cups, she tried to figure out why he was there. Why would he come to her apartment late at night? Why wouldn't he just drive back to his apartment? What kind of game was he playing now? She turned around and saw Carter standing there in her robe. Her robe was extra-big on her, but on Carter, it barely fit. Luckily, it covered everything that needed to be covered though.

"I hope I'm not stretching your robe out too much." He told her, fidgeting with the robe.

"Oh, well, it's ok. It's an old robe anyway." She took his wet clothes from him and put them in the dryer. "It shouldn't take too long for them to dry. I made some coffee if you want some."

"Thanks." He replied, pouring himself a cup.

Lucy went over and poured herself some coffee and then followed him out to her couch. "So if you don't mind me asking, why are you really here? Did your car break down or something?"

"No. My car's fine." He took a drink of the coffee.

"Ok." She nodded. "So if your car's fine, then why are you here?"

"I really needed to talk to you." He finally revealed.

"Ok." She nodded. "About what?"

"I wanted to apologize for what happened last night."

Lucy got up. She wasn't in the mood to talk about what happened. "I don't really want to rehash that conversation."

"Just let me explain? Please?" he asked, interrupting her.

Against her better judgment, she relented and sat back down on the couch. "Ok. Explain."

"I shouldn't have just blurted it out like that. I didn't want to tell you like that. I always thought that I would tell you in a different way—a more romantic way. But it's out there now and we can't pretend that I didn't say it." He noticed that she was staring into her coffee and biting her lip nervously. "I also shouldn't have left here like that yesterday. I didn't want to..."

"Then why did you?" she asked angrily, looking up at him. "I mean, you tell me that you're in love with me, and then you just leave like that? It makes no sense."

"I know that." He nodded. "I've been thinking about why I left, and I've finally realized why."

"Well then don't keep me in suspense." She replied sarcastically.

"After what happened in exam six, I always told you that it couldn't happen again because of hospital policy. And while I normally do try to abide by hospital policy, that's not the real reason why I pushed you away. It wasn't why I pushed you away then and it's not why I pushed you away yesterday. The real reason is because I'm afraid of losing you."

"Huh?" she commented, confused.

"I wouldn't be able to deal with losing you. It was hard enough when you were in the coma. It would be too hard if I let myself love you and then I lost you." He confessed.

"You can't choose who you fall in love with." She pointed out. "And if I've learned anything from Valentine's Day, it's that life and death are connected by a very thin thread that could break at any time."

"I know. And I realize now that fear isn't a good reason to pull away from love. It's just that I don't have a very good track record with loving people. They either leave or they die."

Lucy looked down at the floor, wondering what all of this meant. "So what do you want from me?"

"It depends on what your feelings for me are. If you just want to be friends...it's fine. I'd rather be your friend than not a part of your life at all." He replied honestly. But he hoped that she would have feelings for him.

Her head was spinning. Was he asking her for a relationship? Did she want a relationship? Could they even have a relationship? "You're really catching me off-guard here."

"I realize that." He nodded.

"And what about the fact that you're my teacher and we could get in a lot of trouble for this?" she asked hesitantly. She got up from the couch and started walking around.

"Well I'm aware of the risks we'd be taking and the consequences of our actions if we got caught. But with any luck, we wouldn't get caught." He explained.

She paced around the floor, trying to make sense of what he was saying. He wanted to be with her and he loved her. She had never expected this. I mean, she had wanted it to happen for a long time, but she never thought that Carter would think of her as anything but an annoying med student that got him attacked. Stopping in the middle of the floor, she spoke again. "This isn't a game that you're playing, is it? I mean, you're not gonna wake up tomorrow and completely change your mind?"

He got up and walked over to where she was. "This definitely isn't a game. I love you Lucy, and I'll love you for the rest of my life."

Praying to God she wasn't making the biggest mistake of her life, she leaned in and lightly kissed him. "So you don't mind keeping this a secret?" she asked, pulling away from the kiss before it got too passionate.

He shook his head. "No, I don't." he looked deep into her eyes. "Are you sure about this?"

She nodded. "Yeah. I am." She kissed him again. This time it was more passionate. Grabbing his hand, she continued the kiss as she led him back to her bedroom.

_Song Lyric: "Shadow-Boxer" By Fiona Apple_


	6. The Morning After

The Lucky Ones

Chapter Six

_Say the first thing that _

_Comes into your mind when you see me _

_If it looks like it works and it feels like it works _

_Then it works _

_With the sun on your face _

_All these worries will soon disappear _

_Just follow me now_

The next morning, Lucy snuggled up next to John and continued to lay her head on his chest. Then she realized what she had done. She had practically used him. Here he is, in love with me, and I have no clue if I love him back. I mean, he's a wonderful guy, and I have really strong feelings for him, but is that love? Oh God. I still went to bed with him, and he's my teacher. I am a horrible person. I'm so going to go to hell. But it was worth it. It was the best night of my life. Ah! Quit thinking about that! Get your had out of the gutter! She was going to get up when she felt his arms wrap around her shoulders. Oh that feels so good. This feels so good and so right. I feel so safe right now.

"Morning." Carter spoke, kissing the top of her forehead. He was definitely happy. Last night had been the greatest night of his life. He hoped that Lucy wasn't having second thoughts, because he wasn't. But if she was, he'd find a way to make her see that they should be together. He thought that last night had proved that.

"Morning." Lucy replied.

"How did you sleep?"

Another realization hit her. "You know, I think that last night was the first night that I haven't had a nightmare. Maybe you're my very own dream catcher." She laughed.

He laughed with her. "I'm glad you slept well. I did too." He looked over at the clock and cussed. "Damn. I better get going if I'm gonna go back to my apartment and get changed in time for work."

"Yeah. I should probably get ready too." Lucy agreed as she got up.

"I wish we had more time to talk."

"We can always talk later." Lucy reminded him.

"Yeah." Carter nodded. "When does your shift end today?"

"Seven. You?"

"Same. How about we go out for dinner then?"

She smiled. "Sounds good."

"Great." He grinned. He walked over to where she was standing and wasn't sure where to kiss her goodbye. He finally decided on kissing her cheek. "See you at work."

"Yeah." Lucy replied. After he was gone, she let out a huge breath and sat on the edge of the bed.

* * *

Lucy entered the lounge that day and smiled brightly when she saw Dave there reading the newspaper. "Hey." She greeted.

Dave looked at her strangely. "Hey Lucy. What's got you so happy?"

"What are you talking about?" she asked, wondering what he meant.

"You were humming when you came in here." He pointed out.

"Was I? Huh. I didn't know that." She shrugged. "Does my humming bother you?"

"No. I just wondered what caused this sudden mood change in you. Last night you weren't exactly happy enough to hum and now suddenly you are." He lowered his voice. "Is it that time of the month for you?"

She swatted his arm with a folded newspaper. "No! And you can't just go around asking women that!"

"Ok! Sorry." Dave threw his hands up. "So then why are you so happy?"

"Sorry, but I can't really tell you right now." She apologized. "Maybe later."

"Fine. My break's over anyway." He grunted before leaving the lounge.

Lucy walked over to her locker and opened it. She didn't notice that she was humming earlier. She then wondered if anyone had noticed. She was getting ready when she felt arms wrap around her waist.

"Hey Luce." John whispered in her ear.

The sound of his voice whispering his nickname for her sent tiny chills down her spine. But they were good tiny chills. "Carter. You startled me." She whispered back as he started to kiss her neck. "You sure this is a good idea? What if someone walks in?"

"I'll tell them I was giving you the Heimlich Maneuver." He laughed.

"I don't think they would buy it." She laughed.

"Why don't you start calling me John? Obviously not at work, but outside of the hospital."

Lucy pulled out of his grasp. "I'll think about it."

"Is something wrong?" he asked, noticing that she looked like something was bothering her.

"No. Nothing's wrong." She shrugged, looking at her watch. "We better go."

"Ok." Carter replied, still thinking that something was bothering her.

* * *

It was a busy day for the ER and Carter and Lucy didn't have any time to talk until after their shifts were over. They were walking out of the ER together. "Carter, we really need to talk."

"What about dinner?" he asked.

"This is important. We can eat after we talk. So why don't we go back to my place?" Lucy suggested.

"Ok." He agreed. Maybe now he could find out what was bothering her.

Within a half hour, they were sitting on her couch in silence. "I don't know if I love you John."

That statement threw him for a loop. "Where did that come from?"

"I've been thinking about this all day. I feel so incredibly guilty about last night. I mean I have really deep feelings for you. I have for over a year, but I'm not sure if it's love. I've never been in love before, so I don't really have anything to compare these feelings to. All I really know is that last night was the only time since the attack that I have felt safe and...alive again. But that scares me." She paused for a moment. "You scare me." Lucy explained, trying not to cry again. She's cried enough for a while.

"I scare you?" He was confounded by her statement. "How?"

"Well yeah. You do kinda scare me a little bit. I constantly think about you. It doesn't even matter what I'm doing. I remember one time I was thinking about doing laundry, and all of a sudden I started thinking about you." She saw him chuckle and gave him a dirty look. "Look, the thing is, you're everything that I've wanted in a guy when I was little. I had this list I made when I was twelve and it stated all the qualities I wanted in a guy. It's really scary how many qualities you share with the list. But I just don't think it would be fair to you if you were in a relationship with me right now. I mean, I'm not the most emotionally-grounded person in the world, and I can't even label my feelings for you..."

He decided to interrupt her right there. "Why don't you let me decide what's fair to me? I don't care if you can't honestly say you love me right now. I'm sure after some time with me, you'll feel the same way I feel about you."

Lucy laughed and grinned. "You have quite possibly the biggest ego I've ever seen!"

"Yeah; maybe I do." He grinned. "But look, as for being emotionally stable, you're not the only one in this room with some instability. Maybe we could help each other." He suggested.

She thought about what he was saying. "You aren't mad at me because I can't tell you that I love you right now?"

"Why would I be mad at you for telling me how you feel? Luce, you were honest with me. I'm not going to get mad at you for telling the truth."

"Thanks." She smiled slightly. "So about our relationship...you really don't mind that we're going to be breaking a ton of rules and keeping secrets from everyone that we know?"

"Not one bit." Carter smiled.

"I don't really either." Lucy replied as she brought his lips to meet hers.

"So do you still have this list that you were talking about?" he asked curiously.

She grinned. "Yes, but I'm not showing it to you."

"Why not?" he pretended to pout.

"Because it's private." She explained.

"Oh c'mon Luce!"

She paused, as if considering his request. Then she shook her head. "Nope. If I showed you the list, you'd only get a bigger ego and then I don't think you'd be able to get your head through the doorway."

"Fine." He resigned, giving her another kiss. He then led her back towards the bedroom.  
  
"What about dinner?" Lucy asked as he started to kiss her neck.  
  
"It can wait." Carter grinned.

* * *

The next morning, Lucy and Carter were sitting at the breakfast nook in her apartment, eating toast and drinking coffee. "So while you were in the shower, I was thinking about some things..." Lucy replied, looking into her coffee mug.

"Oh really? What kinds of things?" Carter asked, putting more butter on his toast.

"Well this is the second night that you've stayed here and then in the morning you always have to rush off back to your apartment. I was just thinking that if you wanted to leave some things here, you could. If you want to, that is."

"Are you sure? That's a big step. I don't want to rush you."

"Well it makes sense if you think about it." She brought her eyes up to meet his. "It will save you some time. I could clean out a drawer for you."

"Well yeah. That would be nice. Thanks." Carter nodded, giving her a quick kiss. "So what other things were you thinking about?"

"You never got any therapy after...did you?" She noticed him shake his head and continued. "Neither have I. I was thinking that maybe we should both get some therapy."

"I don't know Luce...I'm not really sure..." He had been avoiding the therapy issue for months now. Everyone seemed to want him to go, but he didn't really think he needed it.

"Why don't you just try it once? That's what I'm going to do. Maybe this is what we need...what we've been missing. I really want this relationship to work..."

"So do I." Carter interrupted.

"But it won't work if we're both still constantly being haunted by what happened. I know that I need some therapy and I don't think it would hurt you to go either." Lucy explained.

"What made you so enthusiastic about therapy?" Carter asked. He was sure that getting her some therapy would take some time, and was sort of surprised by her yen for some help.

"You did." She said softly. "I don't want to feel like this anymore. I don't want to have this hanging over my head. I want to be happy again. I want my old life back." She got up and took her plate into the kitchen.

Carter stuffed the rest of his toast into his mouth and followed her into the kitchen.

"I want to appreciate being alive and I want to live as close to a normal life as I possibly can."

Carter could tell that she was serious because when she was talking, her whole face lit up. He hadn't seen that happen in a long time. "Ok, but I'm confused. How am I responsible?"

"When we got together, I felt that old spark come back to me. It was the first time that I felt alive again and it was because of you. I got thinking about the story that you told me about what Dr. Benton said to you, and something just clicked. I don't want you to ever see me like I was on Halloween. I was a complete mess that night. I want to be better than that." She explained.

He was blown away by her answer. "Well I think therapy is a good idea. I'll think about it. Ok?" he asked.

"Ok." She smiled.

He pulled her into a steamy kiss. "I love you Lucy, and I know that you'll be able to go through therapy and be fine." He kissed her once more. "I've gotta go though, or I'll be late. I'll see you later?"

"Yeah. Bye." The smile that she was wearing slowly left her face once he was out the door. 'He's right. I'll be fine. Right?'

* * *

Lucy was on her way into the ER when she saw Dave standing outside, drinking some coffee. "Hey." She greeted.

"Hey. Have you been avoiding me?" he asked.

"No" She shook her head. "Why do you think I've been avoiding you?"

"Well you've just been kind of distant lately." He pointed out. "Is there something going on that I don't know about?"

Lucy didn't know what to say. She wanted to tell him about her new relationship with Carter, but didn't know if she should without talking to Carter about it first. "Well, I'm starting some therapy today."

"Really? When did you decide to do that?"

"Last night." She answered.

"Ok." Dave replied. "So you're not mad at me for anything?"

"No! Of course not. I'm sorry if you thought that I was." She apologized.

"It's ok. Don't worry about me."

"I'll talk to you later." She smiled, going inside to start her shift.

Dave watched her go inside and sighed. There was something that she was hiding from him, and he bet it had something to do with Carter. Sooner or later, he would figure out exactly what was going on.

* * *

About noon, Lucy found Carter alone in the lounge. "Hey, you want to go to lunch together?" he asked.

"Love to, but I can't. I'm actually busy with something." Lucy replied.

"What? Another man already?" Carter laughed.

She laughed too. "Actually, yes. I have an appointment with Dr. Meyers."

"Oh. Ok." He replied. "You ok about it?"

"I'm a little scared. I've never really told anyone the whole story of what happened—except for the police, but even then it was different. That was more based on what happened, and not what I felt." Lucy answered.

Carter closed the gap between them and gave her a hug. "It will be ok. If you want to talk about it later, we can. Or we can not talk about it if you want."

"Thanks." She knew that she was lucky to have him in her life.

"So how about dinner tonight?"

"Sounds great!" She gave him a quick kiss. "I better get going."

* * *

That night, Carter decided to take Lucy out to dinner instead of having to cook. "So where are we going?" she asked.

"It's this little Italian restaurant that I found awhile back. I thought it would be perfect for our first date. No one at the hospital knows about it." Carter replied as he continued to drive.

Our first date. God, that sounds so weird, but that's what this is. "Well I'm sure it will be great. I love Italian food."

"That's what I thought." After a moment of silence, he decided to ask the question that he had been wanting to ask all day. "So how did your appointment go?"

"I'm not sure." Lucy finally said after a long pause. "I told him everything that had happened—the attack, recovery, and everything up to now. But I left out the part about us. A girl's gotta have some secrets." She smiled. "It actually felt good to let everything out. I'm gonna go back in a couple of days. I've decided to go twice a week for now."

"I'm glad Luce. I mean, not that you have to go to therapy, but that it seems to helping you." Carter told her.

"I still think it could help you too." Lucy told him in a quiet voice.

"I thought about that while I was eating my lunch alone today. I think I'll take your advice and at least go talk to Dr. Meyers once. Can't really do any harm, can it?"

"Nope. I'm glad." Lucy smiled.

_Song Lyrics: "Wow" By: Snow Patrol_  
  
**A/N: I have to send a huge thank you to everyone who has sent me a review on this story! I love knowing that there are still Carcy fans out there who are enjoying this story. So thanks!**


	7. A Big Step Forward

The Lucky Ones

Chapter Seven

_From behind these walls I hear your song  
Oh, sweet words  
The music that you play lights up my world  
The sweetest that I've heard  
Could it be that I've been touched and turned  
Oh Lord, please finally...finally things are changing_

The next morning, Lucy laid a plate of toast and eggs in front of Carter and then sat down to eat her plate. "So, I was wondering what your opinion would be about something."

"About what?" he asked.

"Well, you know that I have a close friendship with Dave, right?"

"Yeah. I'm still trying to figure that one out." He laughed. He had no idea why she was friends with someone like Dave. He was just so irresponsible.

"What would you say if I wanted to tell him about our relationship?" she asked with some hesitation.

"Are you serious?" he laughed, looking at her like she was crazy.

"Yeah." Lucy nodded. "And don't look at me like that!"

"It's not a good idea to tell him." He replied flatly.

"Why not?"

"Because the last thing we need is anyone at the hospital to know about us and that includes Dave." He explained. He failed to mention the fact that he didn't trust Dave.

"He's already figured out that something's going on. It's only a matter of time before he realizes that we're together." She protested.

"I still just don't think that it's a good idea." He shook his head. "We have to be careful. If you tell Dave, then he's one more person who knows and could get us in trouble. Besides that, he could get in trouble for withholding information. Do you really want that?"

She hadn't thought about what would happen to Dave if anyone knew that he was aware of her relationship with Carter. "No. But I really don't think that he would tell anyone."

"Luce, I love that you want to be a good friend to Dave, but I'm sorry. I don't think you should tell him. I mean, I think it's bad enough that you've told him that I love you."

"Ok." She relented. "Fine." Then she got to thinking about his last statement. "Wait. How did you know that I told him that you love me?"

Uh-oh. He shouldn't have said that. "I uh, might have overheard it somewhere..." he tried to sound casual.

"Were you eavesdropping on me?" she asked, getting angry.

"I didn't mean to." He apologized.

"That was a private conversation!" she yelled.

"I'm sorry. But I went up there to think. I found you talking with Dave and it was about me. So I listened for a while." He explained.

"How much did you hear?"

"Enough to know that you were really mad at me."

"I can't believe you eavesdropped on me!" she yelled.

"I'm sorry. I really am. Forgive me?" he asked, putting on a charming smile.

She sighed. She couldn't really stay mad at him when he flashed her that kind of a smile. "I should be really mad at you, but I guess I'm not."

"I won't do it again." He promised.

"Ok. Good. But for the record, I still think it would be a good idea to tell Dave about our relationship."

"And for the record, I don't." he replied. He could tell that she was a little upset that she couldn't tell Dave about their relationship. He got up and knelt down in front of her. "I'm sorry. But in order to be together, we have to keep secrets."

"I know. It's just easier said than done. He's been a good friend to me, and I don't want to lie to him." She replied, putting a smile on her face.

He stood up. "You know, I could always just leave and then you wouldn't have to keep a secret..."

She stood up and wrapped her arms around his waist protectively. "Oh no you don't! You are not going anywhere."

He laughed and gave her a kiss. "Just checking."

She shook her head and rolled her eyes.

"How much time do we have before we have to go to work?"

She checked the clock. "About an hour. Why?" He picked her up off the ground. "What are you doing?" she squealed.

"You'll see." He kissed her before carrying her back to the bedroom.

* * *

Carter and Lucy rushed into the ER, hoping that no one noticed that they were almost a half-hour late. "You know, we wouldn't have been so late if you hadn't...you know." Lucy pointed out as they got their stuff out of their lockers.

"Well you were pretty vocal about it, but I didn't really hear you complaining." He smirked.

She smiled and felt her whole face turn red. "No, and I'm not complaining now. But we should be more careful and set an alarm if we do that again."

He laughed. "You want to set a time limit for that?"

"Yes, that way we won't be late again." She could tell that he didn't believe her. "You may think I'm joking, but I'm serious." She told him as they left the lounge.

"Whatever." He chuckled.

Dr. Weaver saw Carter and walked over. "Carter! Can I talk to you for a moment?"

"Sure." Carter replied, turning to face her while Lucy decided to go on and get to work on a patient. He hoped that she wasn't going to yell at him for being late. "What's up?"

"You haven't been spending the night in your apartment for the past couple of nights. Is everything ok?" she was worried about him. It wasn't like him to be gone for that many nights without telling her he would be gone.

Carter wondered just how to explain this. He really couldn't tell the truth, so he was trying desperately to figure out a lie that would sound convincing.

"Do you have a new girlfriend that you're hiding or something?" Kerry laughed.

Carter laughed too. "No. No, I'm not dating anyone." He lied. "I've been staying with my grandparents. They've been having some health problems and I wanted to make sure that they were ok."

"Oh. I'm sorry to hear that." Kerry sympathized. "It's nothing serious, is it?"

"No. Nothing life-threatening."

"Ok. I just wanted to make sure you were ok." Kerry smiled. She then turned around and saw Dave. "Dave! Get back to work!" she screamed.

"What did I do now?" Dave exclaimed, looking at Carter.

"Maybe you looked at her wrong." Carter laughed as he went back to work.

* * *

"Ok Mr. Burnside, you're free to go. But you might want to go see your regular doctor in a few days just to make sure that the infection is completely cleared." Lucy smiled.

"Thank you." Mr. Burnside smiled back.

Lucy left the exam room and walked up to the front desk. "Hey Jerry, have you seen Carter? I need to ask him something about a patient."

"Last time I saw him, he was in exam four." Jerry pointed.

"Thanks." She smiled, heading off to exam four. She found him sitting next to the bedside of a man who was unconscious. He was making notes in the guys' chart. "Hey." She greeted softly.

"Hey." He greeted back, turning to smile at her. He saw that she was hesitating to say anything else and looking at the patient. "Don't worry. He's completely out of it. We can talk freely."

"Oh." She nodded. "So what did Dr.Weaver want to talk to you about earlier?"

"She wanted to know why I haven't been at my apartment at all lately." Carter replied. "I guess that's what happens when you rent the basement of your boss's house."

"So what did you tell her?"

"I lied and told her that I was staying with my grandparents for a few days. I told her they had some kind of illness I wanted to monitor. She bought it, but I don't think that excuse will work for very much longer." He explained as he stood up and put his arms around her waist.

"So what are you going to do? She's gonna get suspicious if you don't spend the night there. There's no way I can spend the night there without getting caught, but I've really gotten used to waking up in your arms."

"Addicted to me already?" he grinned, jokingly.

She looked down to the ground, not wanting to answer the question because truthfully, she had. She was getting very addicted to him: his laugh, his smile, his voice, his touch. They had only been together romantically for a short time, but on some level of her conscious mind she knew that he was the one person that she was meant to spend the rest of her life with. "I bet your ego would love it if I said yes, wouldn't it?" she grinned, looking him in the eyes again.

"Absolutely."

"That's why I'll never say it." She teased. "But I'm still worried about this whole apartment mess."

"Don't worry about it. I'll figure something out." He kissed her forehead.

"Ok." She replied. But she couldn't help worrying. It was something that she had a lot of practice doing and was very good at.

* * *

That night, Lucy paced the floor as she waited for Carter to come home with their Chinese take-out order. She had been thinking about the whole apartment problem all day and might have figured out a way to solve the problem. Now she just had to run it by him.

"Food is here." Carter announced, walking through the door and setting the food on the table.

"Great. I'm hungry." She told him, starting to sort out all of the food.

He wrapped his arms around her waist and kissed her neck. "So am I."

She knew what he meant by that statement, but it would have to wait until later. "We can do that later." She giggled. "Right now I want to eat and I have a proposition for you."

"Ooh, a proposition? About what?" he asked curiously.

She sat down on the floor in front of the couch, setting her food on the coffee table. She waited until he had sat next to her and done the same to continue. "Well, I've been thinking about what you should do about the whole apartment dilemma. I think I have a solution."

"Ok. Let's hear it then. What is it?"

"Move in with me." She told him casually, starting to eat her food.

He looked at her strangely. "You want me to move in?"

"Yeah. Sure. Why not? You spend almost all your time here anyway."

"Yeah, but moving in together is a big deal. We haven't been together very long..."

"So is that a no?" she interrupted. She was really hoping that he would say yes.

"It's not a no," he told her, "I just want to make sure that this is something that you really want."

"I wouldn't have suggested it if I didn't want you to actually move in." She reminded him.

"Then I guess you just got yourself a roommate." He smiled, leaning over to kiss her.

* * *

By Sunday evening of the weekend, both Lucy and Carter were exhausted after moving all of his stuff into her apartment. "I honestly didn't think I'd have enough room for all of your stuff. I guess I was wrong." Lucy commented as they laid on the couch, intertwined in each other. Lucy had her head on his chest, while Carter was gently stroking her arm.

"Well it's amazing how much stuff you can fit in a closet before it will explode." He laughed.

"Yeah." She laughed. "I'm glad that Dr. Weaver didn't ask you too many questions about why you were moving out."

"After I lied and said they were having health problems, she seemed to believe that I wanted to live a little closer to them. I do feel a little guilty using them as part of my lie though." He explained.

"Well you're lying for a good cause." Suddenly the phone rang. She reached over to the table next to the couch and picked up the phone. "Hello?"

"Hey Lucy." Dave greeted.

Lucy looked at Carter. "Dave! Hi. How are you?"

"Fine. My date for tonight cancelled. I was wondering if you wanted to go catch a movie with me." He was testing her. He had a feeling that she was going out with Carter, and was trying to trap her into admitting it.

"Oh, a movie?" she asked. "Well I'm not sure. I don't really feel like leaving the apartment tonight."

"Well I could go rent a movie and bring it by." He suggested.

"No!" she practically screamed, then lowered her voice. "Uh, I mean, I'm really tired. I think I'll pass. But maybe I could have a rain check?"

Dave smiled. He loved making her squirm. Sooner or later she would admit that she was dating Carter. "Ok. Then I'll see you at work. Goodnight."

Lucy hung up the phone and looked at Carter, who was looking at her suspiciously.

"What was that all about?" he asked, trying hard to contain his jealousy.

"He wanted to go to the movies with me. His date cancelled on him." She replied casually.

"Just how close of friends did you two become?" he asked, suspiciously.

"What? What exactly are you asking me?" she asked.

"I'm just curious."

"We're just good friends." She replied. "We've never kissed, and we've definitely never had sex. So are you happy now?"

"I didn't mean to upset you. I just wondered if I was going to have any competition." He apologized.

She leaned over and kissed him. "He's not competition. He's my friend. That's all. I don't think of him in that way. If anything, he's more like a big brother."

"Just checking." He smiled, pulling her back for another kiss.

Lucy pulled away. "I know you don't want to hear this, but I still think we should tell him about us. He's just gonna get more and more suspicious as time goes on."

"Luce, we've already had this conversation..."

"I know, I know, I know. We shouldn't tell him." She rolled her eyes and then grinned. "You know, you're cute when you're jealous."

"I am?" Carter asked, acting innocent.

"Oh yeah." She nodded.

"How cute?" he wondered.

She kissed him. "Very...very...cute." She kissed him again.

_Song Lyrics: "This Land Is Mine" By: Dido_

**A/N: Thank you for all of the nice reviews! I may not be able to update this story again until sometime late Friday. But I'll try my hardest to get another chapter out tomorrow. I'm just not promising anything. Thanks!**


	8. The Set Up

The Lucky Ones

Chapter Eight

_When I'm with you baby, I go out of my head  
And I just can't get enough, I just can't get enough  
All the things you do to me and everything you said  
And I just can't get enough, I just can't get enough  
We slip and slide as we fall in love  
And I just can't seem to get enough_

The next day, Lucy woke up to the stench of burned eggs. She slowly raised herself from the bed and saw that Carter wasn't sleeping next to her. So that meant he was cooking, and he was responsible for the burnt eggs. Looking at the clock, she knew that she should go ahead and get up now. She dragged herself to the kitchen and saw Carter still trying to make eggs. "You should just give up." She told him, yawning.

"And become a quitter? Never!" He turned around with a spatula in his right hand. "I wanted to surprise you with breakfast."

Lucy smiled. "That's really sweet." She walked over to him and put her arms around his waist. "But you obviously can't cook."

"I can make toast." He smiled, pointing to a plate on the counter.

She looked over at the plate on the counter. It contained toast that was completely black. "Ok. Do you always like your toast extra black?"

"Well...I'm just not used to your toaster settings yet." He had never been able to cook anything. So in the past, he had always just ordered take-out or had food delivered to him. He just wanted to do something nice for her.

She didn't believe him and instead took the spatula out of his hand. "Why don't you leave the cooking to me?" she suggested.

"Why? Are you some kind of chef?"

"I'm not a chef, but I haven't heard any complaints so far." She pulled away from him and started to make new eggs that wouldn't be burnt. "I didn't like waking up without you." She pouted, while she worked.

He walked up behind her, putting his arms around her waist and kissing her cheek. "Sorry. I just wanted to do something nice for you since you've done so much for me lately."

She chuckled. "What have I done?"

He looked at her strangely. "You really don't know?"

"No, not really." She shook her head.

"You've practically transformed my entire life." He exclaimed, starting to kiss her neck.

Oh, wow. She wasn't expecting that answer. "And this is a good thing?" She knew that it was, but she just wanted to hear him say it.

"Definitely a good thing." He continued to kiss her neck and started to slide the sleeve of her t-shirt off of her shoulder.

She knew what he wanted to go do. "We can't. What about the eggs?"

"They can wait." He whispered into her ear.

She reached over and turned off the stove. Then she turned and faced him. "You know, we do this a lot."

"Do what?" he asked.

"We start talking about something and then we end up rushing off to the bedroom." She explained.

He grinned wickedly. "I just can't get enough of you. Is that a bad thing?" He didn't seem to think so.

She smiled seductively. "No, it's definitely a good thing." They started kissing as they walked back to the bedroom. Then the phone rang.

"Ignore it, please?" Carter pleaded.

Lucy wanted to ignore it, but didn't want to miss an important call. "What if it's important?"

"Then they'll leave a message and you can call them back later." He explained.

The phone kept ringing, and finally, Lucy couldn't take it anymore. "It will only take a minute." She promised, detaching herself from him and picking up the phone. "Hello?...Oh hi Dr. Meyers...Yes...Ok. No, that's no problem...See you then." She put the phone down and walked back over to Carter.

"What was that about?" he asked, wrapping his arms around her again.

"Dr. Meyers just wanted to re-schedule our next therapy session for another time because of a conflict." She explained with a smile. "Which reminds me, have you scheduled your therapy session yet?"

After she asked that question, his good mood changed. He didn't really want to go to therapy. The only reason he was even going to go try it once was to make Lucy happy. But he put a smile on his face. "Yeah. I have an appointment with him today."

"Really? You didn't tell me that."

"I thought I did." He replied, knowing that he hadn't told her about it. He didn't really want to talk about it.

She quickly went through all of their recent conversations in her head, trying to remember if he had or not. She couldn't remember him telling her, but she could be wrong. "You know, you probably did, and I just forgot or something."

He desperately wanted to get off of this topic. "So can we resume what we were doing before the phone rang now?"

She really wanted to talk to him about his therapy, but decided it could wait until later. She put her finger to the side of her cheek, as if she was trying to remember something. "Now what was it that we were doing?" she asked.

"Let me just remind you a little." He smiled, giving her a passionate kiss.

Breathless, she pulled away. "Oh yeah. Now I remember."

* * *

Carter slipped into the elevator right before its' doors closed. He had just come from his therapy session. He frowned, thinking back to what had happened.

"_Now Dr. Carter..." Dr. Meyers started. _

"_Carter." He interrupted. "Just call me Carter."_

"_Ok." Dr. Meyers smiled. "Carter, why don't you tell me what brings you here today?" _

_Where to start? I've come here to appease my new girlfriend--which you can't know about because our relationship is forbidden by the hospital. I really don't have any inclination to get therapy and see it as a big waste of my time and yours as well. But I love Lucy, so I'm doing this for her. He realized that he was taking a long time to answer and started to come up with an answer that he could actually tell Dr. Meyers. "Well I was attacked last Valentine's Day by a patient in this hospital. My friends and family told me to go to therapy, so here I am. I thought I'd give it a shot." _

_Dr. Meyers nodded. "So why do you think your friends and family wanted you to come to therapy?" _

"_They think that the attack is bothering me and disrupting my life." _

"_And do you think that the attack is bothering you and disrupting your life?" _

_This guy isn't doing anything except repeating what I've just said and putting it into a question. How is that supposed to help me? "No. I don't. I'll admit, there was a time when it was affecting my life. But that was just because Lucy was in a coma."_

"_And what did Lucy being in a coma have to do with your life being affected?" Dr. Meyers asked. _

"_I felt guilty about her being in a coma." Carter replied, looking down at the ground. _

"_And do you still feel guilty?" Dr. Meyers prodded. _

"_No." Carter lied. The truth was, he still felt incredibly guilty about what happened to Lucy. No matter how hard he tried, he still couldn't forgive himself for letting it happen to her. He still closed his eyes and saw her lying on the floor in her own blood. That image still wouldn't leave his memory, and it haunted him. He was starting to feel uncomfortable while sitting there. He didn't want to be there anymore. He wanted to be anywhere else, doing anything other than talking to Dr. Meyers about this. Starting to get anxious, he stood up. "Look, I don't want to waste your time. I don't think that I need to be here. I'm ok. I don't have a problem." _

_Dr. Meyers nodded, even though that he knew Carter did have a problem. He just wasn't ready to accept help and move past the attack. "I can't force you to stay here. You're free to leave anytime you wish." _

"_Well thanks for your time, but I think I'll be going now." And with that, Carter left the room. He had tried, for Lucy's sake, but he couldn't do it. _

Stepping out of the elevator, he walked back into the ER. He found Lucy coming out of an exam room and smiled. "Hey." He greeted.

"Hey." She stopped outside the door so that they could talk. "So how was it?" she asked, referring to the therapy session.

"Fine." He replied.

"Just fine?" she questioned. She didn't understand. She had told him about her therapy session, but all she could get from him was fine? That was unfair.

"Well, you know how the first session is." He replied, seeing the look of hurt on her face.

She quickly smiled again. "Yeah. The good news is that each one gets easier."

Each one. She thinks I'm going back. But I'm not.

"I'm proud of you for going."

She's proud of me? He looked at her face and saw that she was smiling brightly. He didn't want to do anything to take the smile off her face, so he decided to let her continue to think he was going to therapy instead of telling her the truth. He hated to lie to her, but how would she ever find out the truth anyway? "I better get back to work." He told her, walking off.

* * *

Later on, Lucy walked into the lounge to get some aspirin out of her locker. She was starting to get a headache and wanted to prevent it from getting any worse. "Oh hey Dave." She greeted, walking over to her locker.

"Hey Lucy. How are you doing?" he asked. Last night, he had finally figured out the perfect plan to find out if there was anything going on between Carter and Lucy. Now he just had to wait for the perfect time to enact his plan.

"I'm ok." She replied, getting a glass of water and swallowing an aspirin. She noticed that he was looking at her curiously. "I'm starting to get a little headache though." She clarified.

"Oh. Sorry." He sympathized with a bright smile.

She walked a couple of steps closer to him. "Look, I'm sorry that I didn't go to the movies with you last night. I was just really tired."

"That's ok." He nodded. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Carter walk into the lounge. Lucy didn't see him because she had her back to the door.

"So we're still friends?" she smiled.

"Of course." He smiled, pulling her towards him and planting a kiss on her lips.

Lucy was completely shocked by the fact that he was kissing her. She didn't know what to do or what to think. It was the last thing she ever expected to happen.

Dave looked up and saw that Carter had left the lounge. He looked angry, but that wasn't exactly the reaction he was looking for. He was hoping for Carter to break them up and tell him to get away from Lucy. He was supposed to yell and scream—thus giving away the fact that he was seeing Lucy.

Lucy quickly pulled away from Dave. "What the hell was that?" she exclaimed. If he wasn't such a good friend, she would have slapped him.

"What was what?" he asked innocently.

"You just kissed me!" she yelled. She couldn't believe that he just did that. Inside her mind, she was trying to think if she had given him any indication that she was interested in him romantically. So far she couldn't think of anything that would make him think that he was more than a friend to her.

"Yeah? So? What's the problem? I didn't think you were dating anyone."

She closed her eyes and shook her head. I told John that we should tell Dave! But did he listen to me? No! And now what am I supposed to do? "Can you keep a secret?" she whispered.

"Yeah." He nodded. Maybe now he would get to know the truth.

"I can't give you all the details but Carter and I are together, and you can't tell anyone. If anyone from the hospital finds out, we'll be in a lot of trouble. We're breaking hospital policy here. You can't even let Carter know that I told you. He would freak out if he knew that I told you about it."

"So that's why you've been so happy lately and haven't been around so much?" Dave asked. He saw her nod. "I knew it! Well, I didn't know it, but I thought so. Congratulations."

"Wait! So if you thought that I was with Carter, then why did you just kiss me?" she asked, confused.

"Because I wanted to know for sure, and I figured that if I kissed you, you'd feel obligated to tell me the truth."

She sighed. She couldn't believe that she had been tricked by him. "Ok. But please don't tell Carter about the kiss? I think it would be better if he heard it from me. He's already suspicious about our friendship. The last thing he needs is to think is that I'm keeping up a secret affair with you behind his back." She laughed. "No offense to you or anything."

* * *

"Uh Lucy..." he was about to tell her that Carter had seen them, but she was already out of the lounge. "Uh-oh. This isn't good." He said to the empty lounge.

Lucy saw a couple of patients and then went looking for Carter. She found him in an empty exam room going over a chart. "Hey." She greeted with a smile. She went over to kiss him on the cheek, but he pulled away.

"Hey." He greeted, turning away from her kiss. He couldn't believe that he walked in on her kissing Dave. She had sworn to him that Dave was just a friend. Obviously that was a lie. To say that he was furious was an understatement.

"Bad day?" she asked, noticing his bad mood.

"Yeah, actually it is." He stood up and faced her. "What kind of a game are you playing with me Lucy?"

"Game?" she was confused. "What are you talking about? I'm not playing any games."

"I saw you kissing Dave earlier and you definitely weren't kissing him like you would kiss a big brother."

"You saw that?" She was afraid that this might happen.

"Yeah. So don't try to lie about it." He exclaimed.

"I wasn't going to!" She paused. "But there's a simple explanation for it. I swear." She assured him.

"I don't have time for explanations right now Lucy. I have patients to see." He walked out of the room, not listening to her as she asked him to stop and talk to her.

Lucy was beyond mad now—but not at Carter. She stormed out of the exam room and found Dave at the front desk. She walked over there and picked up and nearby chart. Without thinking about how many people were around the desk, she started hitting Dave with the chart.

"Ow!" he shouted. "Lucy! What's are you doing? Are you trying to kill me?"

"We need to talk. Now." She told him, dragging him into the lounge and ignoring the strange looks she was getting from everyone.

"What?" Dave asked.

"Carter saw you kiss me!" she exclaimed. "Now he won't even talk to me."

"I know. I knew that he was there watching." Dave admitted.

"You did? And you still kissed me?" She was beyond furious now. "What is wrong with you?"

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to cause problems. I just felt left out of the loop and this was my plan to get back into the loop of information. I thought that Carter would interrupt and get jealous."

"Well you did cause problems, and congratulations because he is jealous." She looked at her watch. 9:01 p.m. "Ok. My shift's over, but Carter still has an hour left. You better talk to him and explain everything before he leaves. If you don't get him to understand that there's nothing going on between us, I will never speak to you again and I will find a way to really ruin your life."

"Wow, you must really care about him to threaten me like that." He smiled. Then he saw her shoot daggers at him with her eyes. "Ok, ok. I'll explain everything."

"Good." She replied, storming out of the lounge.

* * *

Carter stopped in front of the apartment door. He felt really bad about the way that he had acted towards Lucy. But how was he supposed to know that it was all a set-up? He just hoped that she would forgive him for being a jerk. He opened the door and found that Lucy wasn't anywhere in sight. "Luce?" he called out, putting down his coat. He walked into the bedroom and found that she was asleep on top of the bed. Quietly he took off his shoes and joined her on the bed, wrapping his arms around her body.

Lucy felt arms wrap around her and opened her eyes. She turned over and found Carter staring at her. "Hi." She whispered hesitantly, not sure if he was still mad at her.

"Hey." He greeted. "I'm sorry. I should've let you explain things better."

"So Dave talked to you?" she saw him nod his head. "And you're not mad at me?" When she saw him shake his head she snuggled closer to him. "It's not your fault. How were you supposed to know that he staged it all? I would have been just as upset if I saw you kissing another woman."

"That won't happen because the only woman I ever want to kiss is you." He smiled.

"Well the only man I ever want to kiss is you." She smiled, giving him a kiss.

"I'm not happy that Dave knows about us, or the way he manipulated us into telling him, but there's nothing we can really do about that now—except hope that he doesn't let it slip to anyone."

"He won't." she re-assured him. "He doesn't want to face my wrath."

Carter chuckled at her joke. "Your wrath?"

"Well, yeah. My wrath. I can be pretty vengeful when crossed." She laughed.

"Well remind me not to cross you."

"That's right," she smiled, "because you never know what I'll do!"

_Song Lyrics: "Just Can't Get Enough" By: Depeche Mode_  
  
**A/N: Sorry for the delay in getting this chapter out. I hate it when real life interferes with my writing! Thanks for all the support!**


	9. The New Year

The Lucky Ones

Chapter Nine

_You'll be my New Year's Day, my Valentine  
Now I ain't gonna stop until I make you mine  
You'll be my April Fool, my Mardi Gras  
The music on my tongue when I sing fa la la  
You'll be my flower child, in the month of May  
My sunny summer lover on my holiday  
You'll be my autumn leaves, my Halloween  
The winter snow and everything that's in between  
This year I'm gonna take you home  
This year I don't wanna be alone_

The next couple of weeks passed by quickly. Carter and Lucy both worked together on Thanksgiving, but they were apart on Christmas. Lucy went to see her mother and grandfather, but didn't think that it would be a good idea to bring Carter with her. It would've looked too suspicious if both Lucy and Carter asked for the same few days off, and they wanted to avoid suspicious actions. Now it was New Year's Eve. Carter and Lucy weren't lucky enough to get the night off, but at least they were working together. Carter was still letting Lucy and everyone else think that he was still going to therapy. Lucy was still going to therapy twice a week and was working through her problems, but was turning back to her old self, so she was going to stop going soon. They had been very careful not let anyone find out about their relationship, and although they had been the subject of many rumors and pools, no one else except Dave knew about their relationship. Tonight Carter and Lucy had made a pact that unless they were in the middle of a trauma, they wouldn't let anything stand in the way of kissing when the clock struck twelve. Luckily for them, the ER had been surprisingly quiet.

Dave snuck up on Lucy at the front desk. "Hey!" he greeted.

"Dave! You scared me!" Lucy smiled. She looked him over. He was actually wearing a tux. "You're dressed nicely."

"Thanks."

"I think this is the first time I've ever seen you this dressed up." She commented. "You clean up nicely."

"Well I thought I'd try and look tonight. I have a hot date and tonight is New Year's Eve." He reminded her.

"I know that." She smiled, thinking about her plan to surprise Carter. "So who's the lucky girl going out with Dr. Dave tonight?"

"Sandy? Cindy? Sally?" he shook his head and shrugged his shoulders.

"You don't even know her name?" Lucy exclaimed.

"I know it!" He re-assured her. "I just have forgotten it right now."

"I can't believe you've forgotten her name!"

"Well, it's hard to remember every girl's name." He explained.

"Yeah," she rolled her eyes, "you seem to go out with a different girl each night."

He smiled. "I can't help it if every woman I meet wants a piece of Dr. Dave!"

She laughed and shook her head. "You're impossible!"

"Yeah. I know." He paused. "Are you working through midnight?"

"Yep. I'm on until three." She nodded. "Not all of us can get dressed up and go on dates tonight."

"I guess you're right. Someone has to stay behind and take care of the sick people. But tonight it's not me!" He laughed.

"I hope your date goes well. Happy New Year Dave!" She smiled as he left.

"Happy New Year Lucy!" he shouted back.

* * *

A couple of hours later

"Chuni, where's Carter? I need him to sign off on a patient of mine." Lucy asked when she approached the front desk.

"I think he's in the lounge." Chuni replied before burying her head in a catalog again.

"Thanks." She took the chart with her and went into the lounge. She found him asleep on the couch. He looked peaceful, and as she stood in front of him, she wondered what he was dreaming about. Looking back at the door to make sure that they were alone, she knelt down beside him and gave him a long, slow kiss.

His eyes fluttered open and he smiled brightly when he saw her there. "Hey."

"Sorry to wake you, but it's important." Lucy apologized.

"That's ok." He said, getting up on his feet. "Feel free to wake me up like that anytime you want. So what's up?"

"I need you to sign off on a patient so that she can be released." She handed him the chart.

After looking over the chart, he saw that Lucy had completed everything correctly and nodded. He got out his pen and scribbled his name. "There you go."

"Thank you." She smiled.

"So what time is it?" he asked, wrapping his arms around her waist.

She looked at her watch. "It's about 11:44. Almost the new year."

"And almost time for a New Year's kiss." He smiled wickedly. "Maybe we should practice a little?"

She sighed. "You know we can't right now."

"Oh come on! Just a little kiss?"

"I just can't say no to you." She smiled as she kissed him.

He reluctantly pulled away, not wanting to be caught kissing her in the lounge. "What can I say? You've spoiled me rotten."

She laughed. "Why don't go on up to the roof and I'll go discharge Mrs. Johnson?"

"But it's cold outside. Can't we just meet up in an exam room?" He suggested.

She shook her head. Meeting in an exam room would ruin her surprise. "I know it's cold outside, but we don't have very good luck in exam rooms. Do you really want Chuni to find us like she did last year?"

"No." he shook his head. "That's the last thing I want."

"Good. Then go up to the roof and I'll join you there in a few minutes." She smiled.

"Ok. I'll see you in a few." He gave her a quick kiss before she left. When he got to the roof, he saw a blanket stretched out on the ground. On the blanket were a stereo, two glasses, and a bottle of sparkling cider. He shook his head and wondered how Lucy did this.

Lucy opened the door to the roof and saw that John was already sitting on the blanket. He had already opened the bottle of cider and was turning on the stereo. She sat down next to him on the blanket. "Hey. I'm here with two and a half minutes to spare."

"Good." He smiled, pulling her closer to him.

"Do you like it?" she asked, pointing to the set-up she had orchestrated in front of them.

"Yeah, I do. I can't believe you did this. How in the world did you get all this stuff up here without anyone, especially me, noticing?"

"I have my ways, but it wasn't easy. Luckily, the ER hasn't been too busy, you fell asleep and Chuni was always on the phone ordering stuff from that catalog. I thought that this would be a nice way to ring in the New Year." Lucy explained.

"And it is." He kissed her. "It's much nicer than being in an exam room."

Then he gave her a glass of cider and raised his glass to her. "Here's to you Lucy. I've seen the way you've been throwing yourself into therapy and I'm really glad that it's helping you. I love you."

She raised her glass to him. "Well here's to you John. I didn't think that I could enjoy life again, but you've proved me wrong. The therapy that I'm in wouldn't have helped if it wasn't for you and your support. I love you."

"You do?" he asked, hoping that she wasn't just saying that because that's what she thought he wanted to hear and that this wasn't another dream of his.

"Yes." She shook her head. "I truly, deeply, love you. I've known for a while now, but I was just waiting for the right moment to tell you."

He took her glass and sat it down next to his. "You don't know how happy I am to hear you say that." Then he grabbed her face and kissed her with more passion than he had ever used in his whole life.

When they finally separated, Lucy looked down at her watch. It was midnight. "Happy New Year John."

"Happy New Year Luce." He gave her another soft kiss. "This year's gonna be wonderful, and you know why?"

She shook her head. "No. Go ahead and enlighten me."

"Well there's a saying that says the person you kiss at midnight on New Year's Eve will be the person you are with for that year. Since I kissed you at midnight, I get to spend the year with you. And I don't think you know how happy that makes me." He explained.

"Oh I think I know how happy you are, because I'm just as happy." She kissed him. "You are right though. It will be a wonderful year. I'll get to graduate and become a doctor, and we'll be able to let the whole world know how much we love each other."

"It will be nice to tell everyone about our relationship and end all of the rumors."

She laughed. "Yeah, I'm getting tired of the rumors and the pools about our relationship."

"So am I." He looked over at the stereo and held out his hand to her. "Since we have music, wanna dance with me?"

"Love to." She smiled, taking his hand. They started moving to the beat of the slow song; their bodies pressed up as close as they could get to each other because of their coats being in the way. After a couple of minutes, she decided to speak. "I wish I could freeze this moment."

"Why this moment?" he asked with a chuckle. "Couldn't you think of a moment when we're not out in the cold?"

"I don't feel the cold." She looked up at him. "I never feel cold when I'm with you. I just get this overwhelming sense of warmth and security. I love you."

"I don't think I'm ever gonna get tired of hearing that." He leaned down to kiss her. "Tell me again?"

Lucy giggled, burying her head in his chest. "I love you, I love you, I love you." She looked up at him again. "And that will have to sustain you until we get off work, because we should really be getting back now."

"Alright." He grumbled as they headed back inside. Right before they got to the door, she blocked her path. "Just one more time, please?"

"You're insane! You know that?" she laughed. "But I still love you."

"And I love you too." He smiled, holding the door open for her.

_Song Lyrics: "This Year" By: Christina Aguilera_

**A/N: Sorry this chapter seems to be a little shorter than my other chapters. But anyway, I'd like to express my gratitude to everyone who has reviewed this story! Thank you!! :)**


	10. Meet the Grandparents

The Lucky Ones

Chapter Ten  
  
**A/N: In this story, for storyline purposes, Carter gets along with his grandparents and they are very close. I just thought that I should point that out. Also, thank you to everyone reviewing my story! **

Two weeks later

"Do you have any plans for next Friday night?" Carter asked as they were getting ready to go to bed after a long day of work.

"No, why?" Lucy asked, setting the alarm clock.

"Well, I wanted to take you to dinner at my grandparents' house. I want you to meet them. I'd have you meet my parents first, but I'd rather start you off with family members that I actually like." He got under the covers and adjusted his pillow.

Lucy also got under the covers. "You want me to meet your grandparents?" she had heard lots of good things about them, especially his gamma, but was she ready to meet his family?

"Well yeah. They wanted us to come to Thanksgiving dinner and Christmas dinner, but we were working Thanksgiving and I avoided them on Christmas since you were visiting your mother."

"Ok, sure. I'd love to meet your grandparents." She agreed, even though she was very nervous. She snuggled up closer to Carter and tried not to worry about meeting his family.

* * *

The next week went by fairly quick and suddenly it was Friday night. "If you don't hurry up, we're going to be late." Carter called as he looked at his watch.

Lucy came running out of the bedroom, still putting on her earrings. "What do you think of this?" she asked, twirling around. She was wearing a simple black dress that had a conservative neckline and came down to about her knees.

"I think you're gorgeous." He smiled, walking over and kissing her.

"Is it really ok? 'Cause I have this other dress that would probably look..."

"Luce, you look beautiful. Relax. Let's go before we're late."

"Ok." Lucy replied, taking a deep breath. "I'm just so nervous. I really want them to like me."

"All you have to do is be yourself and I guarantee that they will love you as much as I do." Carter replied, grabbing her hand to show his support.

* * *

After about twenty minutes of driving, they finally reached the Carter family estate. "Wow." Lucy said as she noticed how big the estate they had.

"I know it can seem intimidating, but don't worry. These are my nice relatives."

Lucy laughed until she realized that he was being serious. "Oh, sorry."

He opened up her side of the jeep and grabbed her arm, leading her to the front door. He noticed that she still seemed nervous. "You'll be fine." He whispered in her ear.

The door opened and they were greeted by the butler. "Hello Mr. Carter." He greeted in a very British manner.

"Hello Niles. How are you?" Carter asked.

"Very well, thank you. And you?" Niles asked.

"Wonderful. This is Lucy Knight. Lucy, this is Niles. He's been with the family since before I was even born." Carter introduced them.

Lucy shook his hand. "It's nice to meet you."

"The pleasure is all mine I assure you." Niles replied. "I'll go tell your grandparents that you have arrived."

"He seems like a nice guy. But he's kind of formal, isn't he?" Lucy asked after he was gone.

"Niles? Yeah, but it's part of his charm." Carter smiled and kissed her on the forehead.

"John! It's so good to see you!" A voice came from the hallway.

"Gamma!" John greeted. "How are you doing?"

"Oh I'm fine. I do wish you'd stop by more often though. We missed you this holiday season." Millicent Carter replied as she gave her grandson a hug. "But I know that you're busy saving lives at the hospital."

"Gamma, this is Lucy Knight. Lucy, this is my gamma." John introduced.

"It's very nice to meet you Mrs. Carter. John's told me a lot about you." Lucy smiled. She extended her hand out to her, but was instead greeted with a hug. It surprised her, but she quickly returned the hug.

"John's told me a lot about you too dear, and I'm very glad that he has you in his life. I was so worried about him for a while there, but now...now he's happier than I think I've ever seen him. And please, call me Millicent. There's no need for you to use formalities."

"Well thank you...Millicent." Lucy finally managed to say. She wasn't expecting John's grandmother to be so nice to her. After all, she wasn't even close to being in the same social class as the Carter's.

Millicent took John and Lucy's arms and led them to the dining room. She had seated Lucy and John next to each other. "Your grandfather will be right down. He had some business that he needed to take care of. But he said to go ahead and start eating without him." The food was already out on the table. "Well, go ahead you two. Don't let it get cold!"

After they had passed around all of the food, John's grandfather came into the room. "John! How are you doing?" he asked.

"I'm fine grandfather, and you?" John asked.

"Well I won't lie to you. Getting older isn't as much fun as you might think. But I'm doing good." John Carter Sr. replied with a smile. Then he pointed at Lucy. "So is this the infamous Lucy Knight I've been hearing about for so long?"

"Yes, it is." Carter nodded.

"Well welcome Miss Knight. I applaud you for being able to put the smile back on my grandson's face." Mr. Carter smiled.

"Thank you Mr. Carter. But please, call me Lucy."

"Only if you'll call me John."

"Ok." Lucy smiled. Maybe I have nothing to worry about after all.

* * *

The rest of dinner went well. Lucy was starting to feel very comfortable around his grandparents. As the dishes were being cleared, John's grandfather asked Carter to go into his study to get his opinion about something. That left Lucy with Millicent. "Thank you so much for dinner. I don't know when I've had such a wonderful meal."

"Oh it's no problem dear. Why don't you come with me to the library where we can talk?"

"Ok." Lucy replied. As she followed her to the library, she started having bad thoughts. 'Uh-oh. She doesn't like me and now that John's not here, she's going to tell me how much she doesn't like me.' She sat down on the couch while Millicent sat in a nearby chair.

"I hope you don't think that I'm being too noisy, but can I ask you a question?"

"Sure. Feel free to ask away." Lucy smiled nervously.

"It hasn't been easy for you, has it?"

"Excuse me?" Lucy asked, not sure what Millicent was talking about.

"The aftermath of the attack. It hasn't been easy for you, has it?"

Lucy got quiet for a moment and took a deep breath. "No, it hasn't."

"I know that it hasn't been easy for John. Especially when you were still in the coma. But now, I hear that you've gotten him into therapy. Congratulations on that one by the way. His grandfather and I had been telling him to do that for months but he always refused. Kept saying that he didn't need it, even though it could help him. I'm glad that he at least listened to you."

"Well therapy can really make a difference. I know it's making a big difference in my life. I'm just really sorry that he got hurt too. I don't know what I would've done if he had...well, I don't even want to think about that."

"Neither do I dear." Millicent smiled warmly. "You know, John has told me several times that you are incredibly special, and know that I have had a chance to talk to you I realize he is right."

"Well John is incredibly special too. I'm not sure where I'd be right now if it wasn't for him."

Just then, the phone rang. Millicent reached over and grabbed the telephone. "Hello?...Oh hello Beverly. What's wrong?...Oh. Hold on a moment." She covered the phone with her hand. "Lucy, I hate to do this, but I have to take this phone call."

"Oh don't worry. I'll go. Is it ok if I look around the house?" Lucy asked, getting up.

"Oh yes of course. Feel free to look around all you want." Millicent replied.

Lucy left the library and started to explore the rest of the house.

* * *

Meanwhile, in the study, Carter was continuing to talk with his grandfather. "What do you think of Lucy?" he asked.

"She's wonderful. I think you've done well." John replied.

"I really love her."

"And I can tell that she really loves you."

Just then Lucy was walking by. The doors to the study weren't closed all the way and Lucy was intrigued when she heard voices coming from inside.

"I knew she had to be special in order for you to risk your entire medical career just to be with her." John replied.

"She is well worth the risk. She's one in a million." Carter replied.

Lucy smiled at Carter's last comment but felt bad about putting his medical career at risk. The worst they could do to her if they found out about her relationship with Carter was kick her out of med school, and she could easily get into another school. But Carter, he would no doubt be fired and probably wouldn't be able to find a job with another hospital in the area. She thought about this as she walked away from the door.

"I want to marry Lucy." Carter told his grandfather.

"Right now?" he grandfather laughed.

"No." he shook his head. Then he decided to re-phrase his answer. "Well, I wouldn't mind marrying her right now, but I'm not sure that's a very good idea. We've already broken enough hospital policy for now. But when the time is right, I want to ask her to marry me." He explained.

"You really are serious about her, aren't you?"

"I've never been so serious about anyone in my life." Carter smiled.

"Then you better not tell your grandmother about that right now or else she'll have your entire wedding all planned out before you can even ask Lucy!" he laughed.

Carter laughed too, knowing that it was true. "It will be our little secret then." He looked at his watch. "Oh. We better get going. We have an early shift tomorrow."

"It was good seeing you John. I hope we'll get to see more of you and Lucy around the house."

Carter gave his grandfather a hug. "I'll see what I can do. I'll just go find Lucy and say goodbye to gamma."

"Bye John." His grandfather said as Carter left the study.

A few minutes after Carter had left the study looking for Lucy, she passed by the study again.

"Lucy? Is that you?" John Carter Sr. called out as he approached her.

"Hi John. I'm looking for Carter. Wasn't he with you earlier?" Lucy asked.

"Yes, but he went out looking for you. But since you're here, why don't you come in and sit for a minute? John's bound to figure out where you are sooner or later."

"Oh, ok." Lucy replied as she went into the study with him and sat down in the chair across from his desk.

"I know that you and John have had a rough time lately. But I'm glad that at least some good came out of that horrible experience." John smiled.

"So am I." Lucy replied. "We've been very lucky."

"There you are!" Carter exclaimed, walking over to the chair where Lucy was sitting. He kissed her forehead. "I've been looking for you everywhere!"

"Sorry." Lucy apologized.

"Ready to go?" Carter asked.

"Sure."

"Bye grandfather." Carter smiled.

"Yes goodbye John. It was great meeting you." Lucy smiled.

"The pleasure was all mine Lucy. Feel free to come by for dinner sometime—and bring my grandson along too." John joked.

"Night." Carter and Lucy said at the same time as they left the study.

"So, that wasn't so bad, was it?" Carter asked as he wrapped his arm around her waist while they were walking.

"No. You're grandparents are wonderful John. Thanks for letting me meet them."

"Thanks for coming with me."


	11. A Silly Fight

The Lucky Ones

Chapter Eleven

The next day, Lucy and Carter entered the lounge. It was near the beginning of their shift and they needed to get some things from their lockers. "Hey Dave." Lucy greeted as they walked in and saw Dave sitting at the table.

"Hey Lucy, Carter." Dave replied.

"Hi Dave." Carter greeted as he got his things from his locker.

Dr. Weaver came into the lounge. "Carter! Can I talk to you for a moment in private?"

"Sure." He smiled at Lucy and then left to talk to Dr. Weaver.

As soon as Carter and Weaver were gone, Dave turned to Lucy. "So how did last night's dinner go?"

"It was fine. His grandparents are very nice." She smiled.

Dave could tell that she was holding something back. "What aren't you telling me?"

She rolled her eyes. "I just...it's probably nothing. But I overheard Carter talking with his grandfather and his grandfather said something that bothered me."

"Was it a bad comment about you?"

"No! It was nothing like that. He just reminded me that my relationship with Carter could ruin his medical career." She explained. "And that bothers me."

"Lucy, you like to worry. I'm convinced of that now." He laughed.

"Well you may think this is funny, but I don't. You know that I don't want to be the reason Carter gets fired."

"So then break up with him." Dave advised, testing her.

"No!" Lucy exclaimed.

"Then you're going to have to deal with the fact that your relationship could be dangerous to his career."

* * *

Meanwhile, Weaver was talking to Carter in an empty trauma room. "There's no easy way to say this, but Valentine's Day is coming up." Kerry said. She didn't want to bring up old memories, but this was a discussion that needed to happen.

"Yeah, I guess it is." Carter nodded.

"So I wanted to tell you that you've got that day off. Lucy does too. I thought it would be best if you guys didn't have to work here then."

"Ok. Thanks."

"So how has your therapy been going? Are you still seeing Dr. Meyers?" she asked.

He didn't want to lie, but figured he had no choice. "Yeah. It's going ok. You know, it's hard work, but it's going ok."

"Good. I'm glad that you and Lucy are talking to someone about what happened. I think it will help you both a lot." Kerry smiled.

"I should get back to work. Is there anything else we need to talk about?" Carter asked, not wanting to have to stay there and lie to her anymore.

"No. You're free to see patients." Kerry replied, going to go find Lucy. She found Lucy standing at the front desk with a chart in her hand. "Lucy! Can I speak to you for a moment?"

"Sure Dr. Weaver." Lucy smiled as she walked over to where Dr. Weaver was standing. "What's up?"

"Well, I hate to bring it up, but Valentine's Day is coming up soon." Kerry replied. She saw the smile on Lucy's face fall, and felt bad that she had to bring this topic up.

"I guess it is getting close to that time of the year again." She replied, trying put a smile back on her face.

"I just wanted you to know that I'm giving both you and Carter that day off."

A genuine smile formed on Lucy's face. "Thank you Dr. Weaver. I appreciate that, and I'm sure that Carter does too."

"So if you don't mind me asking, how is your therapy going? Carter was very vague."

"Don't feel bad. He's been very vague with me too. I don't think he wants to talk about it. But I've some good progress. I think I'm ready to quit going soon." She informed her boss.

"I'm very happy for you Lucy." Kerry smiled.

"Thanks." Lucy smiled back.

* * *

Later that night, Lucy was sitting on the floor, trying to organize her cd collection. She was waiting for Carter to get back with their food and a video from the video store. She heard the door open and smiled. "Hey. I was wondering what took you so long."

"I ran into Jerry at the video store. He wouldn't leave me alone about my plans for tonight." He explained.

"Do you think he suspects anything?"

"Don't know and I don't care." Carter shrugged.

"Well I care." Lucy replied, standing up and walking to the table, where Carter was pulling the Chinese food out of the take-out bag. "If someone from the hospital finds out about us..."

"It will be ok." Carter interrupted, wanting to re-assure her.

"Yeah? How can you be so sure?" Lucy questioned. "We've broken so many rules already. We're dating, we sleep together, and we live together! Those are three things that a med student and her teacher shouldn't be doing! They could easily fire you for this."

"Well they could throw you out of med school!" he brought up.

"Yeah, they could. But I haven't invested nearly as much time and energy into being a doctor as you have. I don't want to be the reason that you get fired!"

"I don't know what to tell you Luce. Other than everything will be fine." He replied, getting a little annoyed by this conversation. He couldn't understand what was behind this sudden mood change. When he left her to get the food, she had seemed happy. Now she was...well, not happy.

"You know, your blind optimism is very aggravating!" she yelled.

"Yeah? Well one of us has to have some optimism. You seem to be the gloom and doom queen right now." He yelled.

"I'm sorry that I don't have my head up my ass like you seem to!" she yelled louder.

"Luce? What do you want?" he yelled before lowering his voice. Then he said the six words that he never wanted to have to say. "Do you want to break up?"

She looked at the ground for a few seconds before meeting his eyes. "I know that I don't want you to ruin your career over me. So yes, if it ever comes down to being with you or saving your job, I'll save your job."

Carter couldn't believe what she was saying. "Am I the only one in this relationship who is committed here?" he didn't give her time to answer. He grabbed his coat and left because he needed some time to figure out what just happened.

"Fine! Go ahead and leave!" Lucy yelled after him. "But come back." She whispered to the empty apartment. What have I just done?

* * *

A few hours later, John came back into the apartment quietly, hoping that Lucy wasn't still mad at him. He had no idea why they let the fight get so bad, or even what exactly they were fighting about. All he wanted to do was hold her and apologize. He found her lying on the floor asleep among the cd's that she was trying to alphabetize. He put his coat down and walked over to her. Being very careful, he picked her up and carried her back to their bedroom. As he was tucking her into bed, she started to wake up.

"You came back." She whispered, still half-asleep.

"Of course I did." He replied, sitting next to her on the bed.

"I'm sorry." They both said at the same time.

"You're not the one who needs to be sorry. I..."

"I shouldn't have left like that." He interrupted her.

"You had every reason to want to get away from me for awhile." Lucy replied. "I was being horrible to you."

"So what's bothering you?" Carter asked, pulling a loose strand of her hair from her face.

"I over-heard a piece of your conversation with your grandfather last night." She confessed.

"Which part?" he asked, wondering if she had heard the part where he told his grandfather that he wanted to marry her.

"The part where you were talking about risking your entire career to be with me."

"Oh, that part." He was glad that she hadn't heard the part about marriage. He was still hoping to surprise her with that.

"It bothers me. The last thing I want is for you to have your life turned upside down again because of me. It happened last year, and I don't want it to happen again!" she started to cry.

Carter looked at the calendar on the wall and remembered his conversation with Kerry earlier. It was February 2nd. The anniversary of their attack was approaching. He wrapped her in his arms. "I guess that February has kind of snuck up on us, didn't it?"

She nodded her head. "Yeah."

"Luce, everything's going to be ok. Even if people find out about us; everything will still be ok."

"How can you know that?" she asked.

"I love being a doctor and being able to help others. But I love you more. If I had to choose, I'd choose you over medicine every day of the week." He smiled. Then he kissed her passionately to prove his point.

"I'm still sorry." She whispered.

"You don't have to be." He whispered back as he laid down on the bed next to her and wrapped his arms around her, pulling her toward him. "So since it's approaching, what do you want to do on that day?"

She knew exactly what day he was referring to. Valentine's Day; a day that most of the population thought was extremely romantic held only horrific memories for the both of them. "We have that day off. Can we just stay in and be together all day?"

"Sure, if you don't mind being perma-glued to me for a day." He joked. She lightly swatted his arm, so he kissed her cheek. "You know I love staying in with you."

"I just don't feel like dealing with any people." She admitted. Though she knew it was an irrational fear, she still wanted to make sure that nothing bad happened to either of them on Valentine's Day again. That's why she was so glad that Dr. Weaver insisted she take that day off from work. A part of her wasn't sure that she could have dealt with working there on Valentine's Day. It might have been too creepy for her to deal with.

"I know what you mean." He nodded. "So we'll just stay in and find some indoor activities to keep up occupied."

"Thanks." She smiled.

"Well to be honest, I don't think I would feel comfortable going out either." He admitted.

"Then it works out great!" Lucy exclaimed. There was a few minutes of silence before Lucy spoke again. "John, I was wondering something."

"What?"

"If it wasn't for the attack, would we have still gotten together?" she turned over to face him.

"Would we have gotten together?" he repeated her question.

"Yeah. I mean, do you ever think about what we'd be doing right now if it hadn't happened?"

"Not really." He shrugged. "Honestly, I'm not sure if we'd be together right now if it hadn't happened. I'd still be secretly in love with you though. Why?"

"Just wondering. Trying to find the silver lining of what happened." Lucy replied.

"Have you found it yet?"

Lucy snuggled closer to him and put her head on his chest. "Yeah, I think I have."


	12. Return of the Ex

The Lucky Ones

Chapter Twelve  
  
**A/N: Ok, so I'm bringing in a character to cause a little turmoil between Carter and Lucy. Please do not freak out or stop reading this story! Carter and Lucy will still continue to be together and it will ultimately bring them even closer together. Oh, and I'm also re-writing some of the history behind Carter and Anna. In my universe, they dated and were in love before she left Chicago. I welcome all reviews and feedback, so please don't hesitate to tell me what you think about this story! **

_And you say that you feel  
I'm the best thing in your life  
And I know it's real  
I see it in your eyes  
There's no reason for me, to even feel this way  
I know you just enjoy her company  
I think I'm jealous of your girl friend  
Although she's just a girl that is your friend  
I think I'm jealous of your girl friend_

A couple of days later, Mark called everyone to the front desk for an announcement. "So what's up Doc?" Dave asked, trying to be funny.

"Well we have a new doctor coming to work here. But actually, she's not too new. She was here a couple of years ago." Mark announced. He saw her come out of the lounge and pointed to her. "Please welcome back Dr. Anna Del Amico."

"Hello everyone." Anna smiled. She smiled at everyone, but when she saw John, her smile lit up even more.

That did not go unnoticed by Lucy. She looked over at John, who was staring at Anna like a prison inmate looks at a woman after being locked in solitary confinement for a year. She knew the history between John and Anna, and it made her very nervous. But there was nothing she could do about it right now. She couldn't exactly put her arm around Carter's waist to mark her territory so she quickly ducked out of the crowd and grabbed a chart, wanting to think about anything other than John and Anna.

Anna made her way over to the group and greeted everyone. Her last stop was John. "Hello stranger." She smiled.

"Anna? What are you doing back in Chicago?" John asked. She was the last person he ever expected to see again.

"I needed a change of scenery. Figured that I'd come back and see how this place has changed since I was last here." Anna explained. "Aren't you happy to see me?"

"Of course I am!" Carter replied as Anna gave him a hug.

"It's been too long and I'm sorry about that." She apologized.

"Don't worry about it. Our lives went in two different directions."

"Want to go get a cup of coffee and catch up a little?" Anna asked, hoping the answer was yes.

Carter looked around. Lucy had been standing behind him, but now she seemed to have disappeared.

"What are you doing?" Anna asked, looking at him strangely.

"I'm looking for my med student. She was standing right behind me. I wonder where she went."

"So is that a yes or no to coffee?" Anna asked again.

"Uh, sure." Carter replied as they went to the cafeteria.

A little while later, Lucy walked up to Jerry at the front desk. "Hey, have you seen Carter? I need his signature."

"He walked off with Anna a little bit ago. Didn't say where he was going or when he'd be back." Jerry replied.

"Ok." Lucy smiled, even though she didn't feel like smiling. She felt like punching something. She realized that it was probably stupid for her to be this jealous. Carter loved her. But at one time he had also loved Anna. Walking into the lounge, she poured herself a cup of the stale coffee. After one sip, she threw it down the drain.

"Hey Lucy." Dave greeted as he entered the lounge. He sat down and grabbed the newspaper.

"Hey Dave." She sat next to him.

"Lucy, what's your sign?"

"What?" she asked, not understanding the question because she was lost in her own thoughts.

"When were you born? What's your sign? I'll read you your horoscope." He offered.

"Oh I don't really believe in that sort of thing."

"C'mon! It's fun. Most of the time these horoscopes are complete gibberish. So what's your sign?"

"I'm a Capricorn." Lucy finally gave in.

"Ok. Let's see." Dave said as he looked for Capricorn. "Oh, here it is. You may find yourself feeling like an outsider when someone unexpected comes back into your life. Huh, that's interesting considering that Anna came back today. Isn't it?"

"Yeah." She replied sadly.

"Well don't worry. It is just horoscope. Doesn't mean anything. You know Carter loves you." He replied before getting up and going back out there to work.

"Yeah; it's just a horoscope." She replied, half-heartedly. When he was gone, Lucy picked up the newspaper. After reading her horoscope again, she grunted and ripped the paper in half.

"What did the innocent newspaper do to you?" Mark laughed, seeing Lucy rip it into pieces.

"Nothing." Lucy quickly covered. "It was just a bad article."

"Well it must have been really bad to warrant that kind of abuse." He laughed.

"It was." Lucy laughed back. "Since I'm done torturing poor newspapers, I'm going to go back to work now."

"Actually, Lucy, I have been meaning to talk to you."

She stopped about halfway to the door and turned around. "About what?"

"I know how hard you've been working in your therapy sessions, and I just wanted to tell you that I'm proud of you. You've been through a lot this past year, but you aren't taking the easy road out. You're dealing with your problems head-on and you're going to make a great doctor when you graduate in a few months."

"Thank you Dr. Greene. That means a lot coming from you." She smiled.

"Now go out there and do what you do best!" Mark smiled.

Lucy left the lounge feeling a little bit better. But she was still worried about Anna. She heard laughing and found John and Anna standing at the front desk reliving the "old days" with Jerry and Chuni. She took too long deciding whether to approach them or leave because pretty soon Carter spotted her. When he waved her over to join them, she hesitated because she wanted to run away. But she took a deep breath and walked over there.

"I don't think you two have met. Anna, this is my med. student Lucy Knight. Lucy, this is Anna." John smiled.

"Nice to meet you." Lucy said, trying to smile politely.

"You too." Anna grinned.

"Carter, I need your signature on a chart." Lucy told him, not looking him in the eyes. She grabbed the chart from the desk and handed it to him.

"Here you go Luce." He handed it back to her after signing it, making sure that their hands brushed each other.

"Thanks." Lucy replied, leaving them to go do more catching up.

Anna noticed the interaction between Carter and Lucy. "So how long have you and Lucy been dating?" she asked in a casual manner.

Chuni laughed. "They aren't dating. Trust me, if they were, I'd know about it."

Carter started to get uncomfortable, but inwardly laughed at Chuni's comment. "What makes you think that Lucy and I are dating?" he finally asked Anna.

"It's in the way you two were acting towards each other." Anna explained. She looked over at Chuni and Jerry. "Am I the only one that sees it?"

"No!" Chuni and Jerry replied at the same time.

"We actually have a variety of pools going on right now about the levels of their relationship. You're welcome to join in..." Jerry started to explain.

"Jerry!" Carter yelled. "How many times do I have to tell you? Stop running pools about Lucy and me!"

"So you're not together?" Anna asked, trying to get the facts straight.

"No!" Carter lied. "She's my med student! You really think that I would break the rules like that?"

"Well you have broken a lot of rules in the past. It's not uncommon for you." Chuni pointed out.

"Well I'm not breaking that rule." He stormed off.

* * *

Later that night, Lucy was getting plates and napkins for the pizza that had just been delivered. Then Carter came through the door.

"I come bearing drinks!" he announced with a smile.

She smiled. "Good timing. The pizza's here. I stuck it in the oven to keep it warm for you."

He kissed her forehead and sat the beer on the table. "Thanks." He got the pizza out of the oven and moved to eat on the couch. He picked up the TV remote and started flipping through the channels to find something to watch while they ate.

"It was an interesting day." Lucy stated, hoping that Carter would tell her what he thought about Anna being back.

"Yeah. It was." He replied, stuffing his face with pizza.

"I mean, what are the odds that an old girlfriend of yours would come back to Chicago like that?" she stated, still trying to be stealth in her mission of acquiring knowledge.

"I agree. It is very odd." He replied, taking a long gulp of beer.

"So what do you think about it?" Lucy asked, finally tired of the subtle approach.

"What do you mean?" he asked, looking up at her for the first time since the conversation started.

"Just what I said. What do you think about her return? You know, happy? Sad? Ambivalent?"

Carter laughed when he realized that Lucy was jealous.

"What's so funny? I'm trying to have a serious conversation here."

Then he saw that she was serious. She was really jealous of Anna. He stopped laughing and put down his food. "I think it's sexy that you're jealous of Anna, but you don't have to be."

"You think I'm jealous?" Lucy asked, acting appalled. She didn't want him to know that she was jealous, even though she was burning alive with jealousy.

"Yeah. Isn't that why you've been asking me all these questions?"

"No!" she denied angrily. "I'm simply curious. Someone from my boyfriend's past suddenly comes back into his life. I care about my boyfriend therefore I care about what happens in his life."

"Well curiosity sounds a lot like jealousy." He pointed out.

"Well it's not!" she snapped back at him. "And I don't appreciate being labeled as the jealous girlfriend. I am not jealous! I am...I am"

"Simply curious?" he asked, trying not to laugh.

"You think this is funny? This is not funny John!" she was getting madder by the minute.

"I'm sorry, but I do think it's funny. C'mon Luce! It's funny because it's absurd."

"No it isn't." Lucy replied softly. "And if you think it's that funny, then you can just sleep out here tonight." She took her pizza and retreated back to their bedroom.

* * *

The next morning, Carter woke up on the couch. Stretching out he made a mental note: Don't get kicked out of the bedroom again because the couch is way too uncomfortable. He wondered if Lucy was still mad at him. He got his answer when he looked around the apartment and realized that she had already left for work. About an hour later, he walked into the ER and saw her writing something down in a chart. He walked up to her. "Can we talk?" he whispered into her ear.

"Not right now." She replied, walking away.

"John, you look horrible! Bad night?" Anna smiled as she approached him.

"Something like that." He replied.

* * *

About half way through their shift, Carter finally found a chance to talk to Lucy alone. As he sat down next to her on the roof, she moved to get up. But he gently pulled her back down.

"What? Did you come by to laugh at me some more?" she asked, trying to sound sarcastic.

He noticed that she was trying to say it sarcastically, but he knew her too well. He could hear the hurt in her voice. "I'm sorry about that. You know that the last thing I want to do is hurt you, right?"

She nodded. "I know. And I'm sorry too. I am jealous of Anna. I just didn't want to admit it." She whispered quietly.

"You don't need to be. Whatever Anna and I had is and will stay in the past. You're the person that I love now and you're the person I'm going to love fifty years from now."

She rested her head on his shoulder. "I just...I don't know. I can't explain why, but I get the feeling that she still wants you. I think it's the way she looks at you."

"Well I don't know if she still wants me. But even if she does want me, it doesn't mean that I'll suddenly become hers." He reasoned as he wrapped his arms around her.

"Rationally, I know that. That still doesn't change the fact that I'm a little bit paranoid. I've never felt like this about anyone in my entire life. I love you and I can't imagine what my life would be without you. So I guess when something happens or I think something happens that could take you away from me, I get a little crazy. And I guess it doesn't help that you can't tell her that you're already involved with me."

"But that would lead to too many problems. It's bad enough that Dave knows about us."

"I guess keeping our relationship is becoming harder than we thought it would be."

"Well it will only be for a few more months. Then we can tell the whole world if we want to." He smiled. "We could hire someone to write it out in the sky."

Lucy laughed.

"There's that laugh that I love."

"You actually want to hire a skywriter?" she laughed harder.

"Why not? You gotta admit, it's creative and people would talk about it."

"I get the feeling they will talk about us even if we didn't write it in the sky." She pointed out. "But it is creative. You get points for that."

"Are we on a points system now?" he joked.

"Yeah." She joked back.

"So how am I doing?"

"You're doing ok." She replied.

"Just ok?" he asked, disappointed.

"Well, you know, you could easily rack up a ton of points if you kissed me right now." She told him seductively.

"I think I'm gonna love this new points system." he smiled, bringing her lips to meet his.  
  
_Song Lyric: "Girl Friend" By: Alicia Keys_


	13. Will You Be My Valentine?

The Lucky Ones

Chapter Thirteen

_Lately when I look into your eyes I realize  
You're the only one I need in my life  
Baby I just don't know how to describe  
How lovely you made me feel inside  
You give me butterflies  
Got me flying so high in the sky  
I can't control the butterflies_

Carter slowly opened his eyes saw that there was an empty spot on the bed where Lucy should've been. He frowned, not liking the fact that he didn't get to wake up with her in his arms. That's how he always got to wake up. He wondered why she had gotten up before him, then he realized why. They didn't have to work today because it was..., well it was Valentine's Day. He dragged himself out of bed and looked at the clock. 10:02 a.m. He walked out and saw Lucy sitting at the kitchen table, clutching a cup of coffee and staring deeply into it. He grabbed a cup and sat across from her. "How long have you been awake?" he finally asked.

"I dunno. Maybe an hour?" Lucy replied, looking up at him.

He yawned. "Why didn't you wake me up?"

"You looked so peaceful. I know that you haven't gotten much sleep lately." She replied. Her nightmares had almost completely gone away. She had only had one since the New Year. But John had been having a lot of nightmares lately. She figured that it was only normal because the anniversary of the attack was coming up. He'd never tell her what the nightmares were about, but she had a pretty good idea of what they were about.

"Thanks, but you should've woken me up anyway. I don't like to wake up when you're not in my arms." He smiled.

She smiled back. "Sorry."

"No need to be. But what were you thinking about when I came in?"

The smile on her face got wider. "You."

"Me? What about me?"

"I don't know...just everything. Like the fact that I never imagined that you'd be sitting across from me, drinking coffee and looking at me like that!"

"Like what?" he asked. He didn't realize he was looking at her in a special way.

"Like you love me!" she exclaimed. "I never thought that would ever happen."

"Well you're a very lovable person." He told her.

"But there was a time when I thought that you hated me, or at least were extremely annoyed with me."

"And now look at us. We're living together and secretly dating."

"We've come a long way." She pointed out. "Cause I can still remember times when all we could do was fight."

"I'm not proud of those times." He admitted. "But I think part of the reason I would goad you into fights was because you're very cute when you're angry."

"Oh am I?" she asked.

"Oh yeah. You get this cute look on your face." He tried to imitate the look that she makes.

Lucy laughed at the face he made. "I do not look like that!"

"Well, maybe I'm just not conveying the look correctly. But trust me, you are extremely cute when angry." He complimented.

After a few minutes of silence, she took another drink of her coffee and then spoke again. "I know we said we'd stay in today, so what do you want to do?"

He got up and started kissing her neck. "Do you really have to ask?"

"I'm not sure you can keep that pace up all day." She laughed.

"Is that a challenge? 'Cause I love challenges." He got an evil look in his eyes.

"Well fine." She laughed. "Prove me wrong." She was surprised when he picked her up out of her chair. "What are you doing? Put me down!" she squealed.

"You shouldn't have given me a challenge." He replied as he carried her back to the bedroom.

* * *

It was finally about 6 p.m. when they re-emerged from the bedroom. "Wow." That was all that Lucy could say as she opened up the freezer and took out a frozen pizza. After putting it in the oven, she walked back over to Carter and wrapped her arms around him.

"I think that was a personal best for me." He boasted with a smile.

"I guess you have more stamina than I thought. The pizza should be ready in about a half-hour." She said as they went over to the couch and laid down together. "Today's been great."

"Yeah. It has."

"Can we do this every Valentine's Day from now on?" she asked.

"It's fine with me." He replied, but his mind was really a thousand miles away.

Lucy could tell that he was tuning out. "Ok, what's wrong? Do you want to talk about it?"

"What makes you think that something is wrong?"

"It's the tone of your voice." She replied.

He chuckled because she knew him so well. "I guess that the day is finally catching up to me."

She knew exactly what he meant by that statement. "Do you want to talk about it? It might help, especially since you're having nightmares. I'm kinda worried about you."

"You don't need to be." He reassured her, kissing the top of her head.

"But I am. I love you John, and I can't sit back and do nothing while you have these nightmares. You were there for me, now let me be there for you."

He sighed. She was right. It was only fair that he confide in her the way she had confided in him. He sat up on the couch. "The nightmare's always the same." He started, pausing for a moment. "I'm transported back to that day. I see that your name is still on the board and that you haven't completed your work yet. I go into his room looking for you so that I can chew you out about not doing your work and he's not there. But you are. You're just lying there. I think that image of you on the floor will forever be burned into my corneas." He stopped, and felt her wrap her arms around him. "I rush over to you. You look at me and say 'what took you so long?' and it breaks my heart because before I can do anything to help you, you die...You always die." He couldn't help it anymore. Tears ran freely down his cheeks.

Lucy wiped the tears from his cheeks. She couldn't stand to see him this way. It was the first time that he had shown this kind of emotion when talking about his feelings about the attack. It broke her heart. She wanted to cry for him, but knew that she had to be the strong one right now. "Shh, it's ok. John, look at me. Look." He finally looked at her. "I'm fine. I'm not dead. I'm right here; I'll always be right here."

"I know that Luce, but the dreams are so real."

"I know. But do you remember what you used to tell me?" she asked. "You said that dreams don't mean anything. Whether they are good or bad, they are just your imagination working overtime. They aren't real."

"I know that, but it's a lot easier to give out the advise than to listen to it."

She chuckled. "I know. Look John, everything is ok. We're ok."

He quickly pulled himself together. "I'm sorry. I didn't want to ruin this day. I wanted to make this Valentine's Day 100 times better than last year."

She ran her fingers through his hair. "Trust me, you already have." She whispered.

"But I wanted it to be perfect. Instead..."

"Instead, you let me help you. Do you know how many times you've had to help me like this? Frankly, I've lost count. But being able to have you confide in me just proves to me that you love and trust me. And besides, there's no such thing as a perfect day. Although this day has been extremely close." She smiled.

He finally returned her smile. "And the day's not even over yet."

"What does that mean?"

"Nothing." He grinned. "I just have a surprise for you later."

"What kind of a surprise?" she asked, her eyes lighting up.

"You'll just have to wait until after dinner."

"But you know I hate waiting for surprises!" she complained.

"Sorry, but I'm not going to tell you." He smiled.

"Fine." Lucy grumbled, pretending to pout.

* * *

It was later, around 9 p.m. when Lucy finally quit asking him to give her the surprise. They were lying on the couch together, both exhausted from the day's activities. He knew that she had fallen asleep, but he couldn't sleep. He was tired, but he couldn't sleep. He figured that this would be the time that he gave her the surprise. "Hey, you want your surprise now?" he nudged her.

"But I don't want to wear the orange dress." she mumbled, still half-asleep.

He laughed, wondering what kind of dream she was having. "Luce...Luce wake up."

Lucy slowly opened her eyes a little. "John, let me sleep. You've worn me out today."

He grinned. "Yeah, I guess I did. But if you don't wake up soon, you won't get your surprise."

She heard the word surprise and immediately woke up, catching a second wind. "Ooh, yeah! The surprise!" she exclaimed. "What is it?"

"Well I got you a present."

"And that reminds me, I got you one too!" she exclaimed, running over to the closet and taking out a wrapped gift.

"Mine's in the bedroom." He went to go get it and then came back to find Lucy sitting at the table. He walked over. "I want to give you my gift last."

"Ok." She relented, even though she was anxious to find out what the gift was. "Here. I hope you like it. You're a very hard person to shop for. I never know what to get you."

"It's because I already have everything that I want." He smiled, taking the long box from her. Unwrapping it, he opened it to find a nice gold watch. "Lucy, this is great."

"Turn it over." She told him.

He did, and saw a tiny inscription. _To John, Thank you for loving me. Love, Luce_ He looked up at her and saw her smiling at him.

"I love you." She said, reaching across the table to give him a kiss.

"I love you too. This is probably the best gift I've ever gotten."

"Well I'm glad you like it. I came up with about a million different things that I wanted to write on the back, but there wasn't really room to write it all." She laughed nervously.

"I love it." He smiled. "Now, for your gift." He handed the small box to her.

She looked at it for a moment. It was a small, blue box. Ooh, he got me earrings! She smiled. That's good. She needed a new pair of earrings. Then she opened it, but didn't find earrings like she had expected. The smile on her face turned to a look of shock and confusion. "John?" she whispered, looking at him. But he had moved from his seat. He was now kneeling down in front of her. "Wh- what are you doing?" she asked as he took hold of her hands.

"Something that I've wanted to do for awhile." He replied, getting a little nervous. He had practiced this speech in his mind a million times, but now that he was faced with the situation, he couldn't remember the speech. "The first time I met you I knew that there was something special about you. Then after what happened in Exam Six, I knew that I loved you. It's horrible that a tragedy had to bring us together, but it did. And I realize that I don't ever want to live a single day without you by my side. You're my best friend Luce, and I don't even think that there are words to describe how much I love you. You are my best friend, and there's nothing that I want more than to spend the rest of my life making you as happy as you've made me. So, Lucy Knight, will you do me the honor of becoming my wife? Will you marry me?"

Lucy sat there with her mouth hanging open, completely shocked at what he said. She hadn't seen this coming, although she always hoped that eventually he would ask her to marry him. Now he was kneeling in front of her with a ring, and she didn't know exactly what to do. She started to cry.

"Are you alright?" he asked, a little concerned that she didn't answer right away.

She nodded. "That was so beautiful. I don't think that anyone has ever said something like that to me." She continued to cry.

"I meant every word of it." He said, wiping the tears from her cheeks. After a few more minutes of silence, he got impatient for her answer. "So will you marry me Luce?"

She looked at him strangely. "You mean I haven't said yes already?"

"No." he laughed.

She laughed. "I'm so sorry! I really thought that I had told you yes already. I would love to marry you John!" she exclaimed, wrapping her arms around his neck.

He let out a breath that he didn't know he was holding as he gave her a kiss and then hugged her. Then he pulled away and took the ring out of the box. "This was my gamma's ring. She gave it to me a couple of weeks ago. She wanted you to have it."

"Really? It's beautiful." Lucy exclaimed, taking a closer look at the large diamond.

"Not as beautiful as you." He smiled as he slipped the ring on her finger.

"I love you." She gushed as she gave him a kiss.

"I love you too." He replied when they finally pulled apart.

"Happy Valentine's Day." She whispered.

"Yeah, Happy Valentine's Day Luce." He then led her back to the bedroom.

_Song Lyrics: "Butterflies" By: Alicia Keys_


	14. Guess Who Came to the Hospital

The Lucky Ones

Chapter Fourteen

_I've seen her expression  
as she looks in your direction  
it's there in her eyes  
you say there's no connection  
you don't thinks that's her intention  
baby you must be blind  
I know that she wants you  
I know it instinctively  
I know she wants you  
I know that she wants you  
she wants you  
you say you're in love with me_

A couple of weeks later, Carter walked out to the kitchen after taking a shower and dressing. He found Lucy cooking in the kitchen and she seemed to be humming a tune. Standing against the doorframe, he tried to figure out what the song was. But he was having no luck figuring it out. He smiled and chuckled as she started dancing to the tune she was humming, which promptly alerted Lucy to his presence.

"God Carter! You scared me! How long have you been there?" she asked, turning around. She could feel her face turning beet red from embarrassment.

"Long enough. You know, you're even more cute when you're embarrassed." He said, closing the space between them and giving her a kiss.

She blushed slightly, embarrassed that he caught her humming and dancing. "I made breakfast."

"I see. Thanks." He grabbed a plate and sat down, while Lucy did the same. But while he was eating, she was still staring at her engagement ring. "You better take that off soon before you forget, because you can't wear that to work."

"I don't want to keep taking it off." Lucy frowned.

"Well it's only for a little while. In a couple of months, after you graduate, we can tell everyone."

"Yeah." She smiled again. "Do you have a particular time you'd like to get married?"

"I'd marry you right now if I could."

"Good answer, but not the one I'm looking for." Lucy scolded. "C'mon! When do you think we should do it?"

"Anytime after your graduation is fine with me."

"Could we get married in June?" Lucy asked.

"June? Sure. Are you going to be able to plan a wedding by June? That is only a couple of months from now."

"Well it depends. How big of a wedding are we going to have?"

"I don't know. I hadn't even thought about that."

Lucy laughed. "Typical guy!"

"The only thing I really care about is that I get to marry you. Everything else is not important to me." He smiled. "But we should save this discussion for a later time. We should get to work."

"Yeah, you're right." Lucy grabbed her coat and then they left for work. "Geez, when did it start snowing?" she asked, pulling her coat tighter around her body.

"I don't know. But it sure is coming down hard. I wonder how much snow we're going to get." Carter wondered aloud.

* * *

About noon, Lucy was coming out of exam one with a chart. As she dropped it off at the front desk, Chuni picked up the phone. Lucy started to walk over to the lounge when Chuni called after her.

"Lucy! Phone for you on line 3."

"Thanks." Lucy smiled, picking up the phone. "Hello? Lucy Knight."

"Lucy? Hello, this is Millicent Carter."

"Oh hello. How are you?" Lucy asked.

"I'm fine dear. How are you?"

"I'm wonderful. By the way, thank you so much for the gift."

"You're welcome. So I take it that John gave you the ring?" Millicent asked, hoping that she would be able to plan a wedding soon.

"Yes." Lucy replied, the smile on her face getting wider.

"I'm so happy for you both! Have you set a date yet?"

"No, not yet."

"Well if you need any help, please don't hesitate to call me."

"I won't, and I probably will need your help. Thank you so much again. It means a lot to me." Lucy told the older woman.

"I'm just glad to see you both happy."

Lucy saw an ambulance pull up. "I'm sorry, but I've gotta go. We've got a trauma coming in."

"That's ok. You and John should come by for dinner again soon."

"I'll see what I can do. Thanks for calling." Lucy hung up and went to assist Dr. Greene with the oncoming trauma.

* * *

After sending the trauma patient upstairs to surgery, Lucy went back to the front desk to see what the board looked like. She took a look out the window. "Man, it's still snowing pretty hard." She commented.

"Yeah. We're supposed to get a ton of snow today." Dave replied.

"So Lucy, who was that on the phone earlier?" Chuni asked, a little suspicious.

"It was a family member of mine." Lucy replied casually, knowing that there was no way she could tell Chuni that it was Carter's grandmother. "Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go take a break." She hadn't seen Carter much since their shift had started. She opened the door to the roof and saw Carter talking with Anna. She stood there staring for a few moments, trying to figure out if she should listen or not. Before she decided, she heard something that got her attention.

"I still love you John." Anna paused. "I never stopped, and I was a fool to leave you behind. It was the worst mistake of my life, and I've regretted it every single day. We had something special, didn't we?"

Carter thought about it for a moment. "Well, yes, we did."

Anna walked a little closer to him. "So, maybe we should explore the possibility that we could rekindle that relationship." Anna suggested with a smile.

Lucy quietly closed the door to the roof. She leaned against it and started to cry. Not wanting to take a chance at anyone seeing her cry, she ran into the nearest bathroom.

Meanwhile, back on the roof. "Look, if I've given you the wrong impression since you came back, I'm sorry. But I'm not interested in you as anything more than a friend now. What we had was special in it's own way, but it's in the past and that's where it needs to stay." Carter replied, getting up.

"Is there someone else?" she asked, hurt that he was rejecting her.

"I really don't want to be having this conversation with you. I'm sorry. But this can never happen again." He walked off the roof.

* * *

After crying in the bathroom for about fifteen minutes, Lucy finally emerged from the bathroom and decided to walk down to the ER. She knew that Anna was after Carter! She had told him as soon as Anna came back. So why couldn't Carter see it? She had left the roof before hearing Carter's response to Anna practically throwing herself at him mostly because she couldn't handle it if he wanted Anna instead of her. She didn't want to doubt Carter's love, but he loved Anna first. This was confusing her and stressing her out. Could this day get any worse? She walked up to the front desk and saw Chuni. "Does anyone need some help?" she asked, looking at the board and the empty waiting area.

"I think Anna does. The paramedics just brought someone in. Oh, and they said that the city is shutting down the streets due to the snow. Apparently we're in for a large snow storm, so it looks like we're all going to be stuck here for awhile." Chuni replied.

"Great." Lucy said unenthusiastically. "So where is Anna?"

"Curtain two." Chuni replied.

"Ok. I'll go see if she needs help." Lucy replied. Then maybe I'll scratch her eyes out. She looked at her nails and shook her head. No, my nails aren't long enough to do any real damage. Maybe I could just punch her a lot. That thought made her smile. As she approached curtain two, she heard a voice which made chills go down her spine—and definitely not the good kind of chills. The smile that had graced her face fell immediately. It couldn't be. God wouldn't be that cruel to me right now. I must be wrong. I have to be wrong. She pulled back the curtain and came face to face with none other than Paul Sobricki. "You." She stated in a mere whisper. A whisper was all she could muster.

"Oh, um, it's you." Paul stuttered, recognizing Lucy.

"You two know each other?" Anna asked with a smile, not aware of the history between them.

Lucy just stared at Paul. "What the hell are you doing here?" She whispered.

"I fell on some ice outside my office building..." Paul replied. "I'm sorry about happened..."

"You're sorry?" Lucy screamed, finally finding her voice again. "Exactly what are you sorry about? Using the knife to stab Carter and me? Almost killing us? Throwing our lives into a tailspin? How dare you lay there and have the nerve to tell me that you're sorry?"

"Look, I know this is hard, but I'm better now. You're a doctor. I was sick. You know that it wasn't really me that did that to you and your friend..."

"Shut up! I don't care." Lucy whispered, not wanting to listen to him or see him anymore. She had gone to therapy. She was supposed to be past this. She wasn't supposed to fall apart like this anymore. But she could feel herself being pulled back into the memories of that night as she closed her eyes. Suddenly the song that was playing in the background infiltrated her mind. The pumping base line filled her mind, followed by the lyrics: _Come on baby tell me Come on baby tell me Come on baby tell me Come on baby tell me Yes we aim to please._ She could once again feel the knife, digging its way through her skin and she could see Carter falling to the ground after being attacked. She saw the confusion and terror in his eyes. Suddenly she couldn't breathe. She realized that she was going to be sick, and ran off towards the bathroom. She must have run into a half of dozen people, including Carter, but they were all a blur as she continued on to the bathroom. Taking a few deep breaths, she ran into a stall and proceeded to throw up.

"Chuni, what's wrong with Lucy?" Carter asked, very concerned about the way she was just running through the halls.

She looked up from the paperwork she was doing. "I dunno. Last time I saw her, she went to go help Anna in curtain two." Chuni replied.

I have to go find out what's happened. He walked over to curtain two. "Hey Anna, what did you say to Luc-"He stopped when he saw who Anna was treating. It all became clear to him then. "What the hell are you doing here?" Carter yelled.

"I didn't ask to be brought here. I slipped on some ice and hurt my head." Paul explained.

"John, I'm sorry. I didn't know...Lucy, she..." Anna started to talk, but Carter was already gone. "Chuni, call security and get them to Curtain Two ASAP. Also page Mark. Paul Sobricki is back in the hospital. I'm going to go find Lucy."

Chuni wasted no time in calling security and Mark.

Carter knocked on the women's bathroom door. "Luce, are you in there?" He got no response, but this was where he saw her go. "Luce?" he knocked again. "Ok. I'm coming in." He entered the bathroom to find that it was empty, except for Lucy, who was curled up in a ball, sobbing. He ran over to her and wrapped his arms around her. "It's ok. He can't hurt you. Security's on their way down. He'll be gone soon." He kissed the top of her head.

"I saw him and I couldn't breathe." She cried, letting herself be comforted by him.

"Shh. It's ok. Everything's going to be ok."

Lucy finally calmed down, but then she realized that Carter was with her. Carter—the guy who was probably going to break up with her to get back together with Anna. She pushed him away, sending him crashing down to the floor.

"What was that for?" he asked, confused.

"You know what Carter? I don't need you to coddle me and tell me everything will be ok. So just leave me alone!" she yelled, leaving the bathroom.

Carter sat there in the women's bathroom, wondering what had just happened.

Lucy walked straight to the front desk, where Mark was.

"Oh Lucy...I'm sorry. I don't know how he ended up being brought here." Mark apologized. He could tell that she was shaken up and that she had been crying.

"That's ok. When will he be gone?" Lucy asked, trying to be strong.

"That's the thing. The upcoming blizzard has closed all the streets. Everyone is stuck here until the storm passes and they can clear off the roads." Mark replied.

"You mean he's staying here?" she said, trying very hard not to yell.

"Yeah. But right now, I have security watching him. We have him restrained and we're going to clear a room for him upstairs so that he won't be in the ER anymore."

"Great. This day just keeps getting worse and worse by the minute." Lucy complained.

"Why don't you go find Carter and take a break until I can get him admitted upstairs? Maybe go to the cafeteria?" Mark suggested.

"Ok." She sighed. "I'll go to the cafeteria. I'll take a break. But tell Dr. Carter not to follow me." she stormed off.

Carter walked up to Mark. He had been behind Lucy and heard her say that she didn't want him to follow her. Not only that, but she had called him Dr. Carter. She only did that when she was really upset with him.

"What's that about?" Mark asked, watching Lucy storm off angrily. "You guys haven't fought in months."

He shrugged. "I really don't know. It's probably just because he's back, but I'm going to go find out." He replied, walking after Lucy.

* * *

Lucy sat at a table in the cafeteria by the window, staring into her coffee and taking deep breaths to try and calm herself. She was almost calm again when she saw Carter sit across from her. "I don't want to talk to you." She said, not looking at him. If she didn't talk to him, then he couldn't break up with her. It was childish, she knew that, but she didn't really think that she could handle breaking up with him—especially today.

"That's fine. I don't want to talk either." Carter replied with a grin. "I just came to drink my coffee."

"There are plenty of empty tables here. Why don't you go sit at one and leave me alone?"

"Do you really want me to leave you alone?" he tested her.

"Yes I do!" Lucy half-yelled.

"Look, I know you're upset about Sobricki. I am too, but..."

"This isn't about him. Not everything in my life has to be about him!" Lucy exclaimed, getting up from the table. She started to walk off, but Carter grabbed her arm. "Let go Carter."

"Just listen to me, ok?"

"No. How many times do I have to say it? How many languages will it take for you to understand that I don't want to talk to you right now?"

"Luce I'm worried..."

She pulled her arm away from the light hold he had of her arm. "I don't want to talk! So just save your breath and leave me alone." And after saying that, she walked off.

Carter stood there in the cafeteria, watching her walk away with a confused look on his face.

_Song Lyrics: "She Wants You" By: Billie Piper & "Battleflag" By: Low Fidelity All Stars_  
  
**A/N: I have brought Anna back to be the stereotypical "jealous ex", and she will definitely be trying to stir up a lot of trouble between Carter and Lucy. But just because she tries to break them apart, it doesn't mean that she actually will. Or will she?**


	15. Could the Day Get Worse?

The Lucky Ones

Chapter Fifteen

A few hours later, Lucy entered the elevator to go back down to the ER. She had eagerly volunteered to take a chart up to another floor so that she could avoid Carter. Her plans of avoiding him had been working, until now. She rolled her eyes and softly groaned when Carter jumped in at the last second. Ok. I'll just ignore him. It's a short elevator ride.

"You do know that you can't avoid me forever, right?" he asked, with a small smile.

"I know." She looked over at him and, seeing his smile, she couldn't help but give him a small smile back.

"So if the whole Paul Sobricki thing isn't what's bothering you, do you wanna tell me what's really bothering you?" he asked. He was finally starting to break through the ice that she had built up between them during the events of the day.

"No, actually I don't." The smile left her face.

And with that statement, the ice was re-formed and stronger than ever. "Luce..." before he could finish that statement, the elevator abruptly stopped and the lights went out. Luckily the elevator had emergency lights that came on.

"What just happened?" Lucy asked.

"Well, there's that snow storm. Maybe it knocked out the power." Carter hypothesized.

"Great. So now my day has gotten worse."

"Lucy, what is wrong with you?

"Fine. You want to know what's wrong with me? I'll tell you. I'm upset. Yes. Naturally I'm upset that I saw Paul Sobricki and that he's not in jail or a mental institution, but that's not what's really bothering me right now. What's really bothering me is that I overheard Anna tell you that she wants to get back together with you. I told you that she still wanted you!" She took a deep breath. "There! I finally said it." She paused for a second. "Feels good to finally get that off my chest."

"I'm sorry you walked in on that. Did you happen to hear what I told her after she told me that?" He asked, guessing that she hadn't stayed around to hear his side of the conversation.

"No." She replied, looking at the floor. "So if you're going to break up with me, just get it done and over with."

"Break up with you?" He laughed. "Why would I break up with you?"

She looked up at him like he was an idiot for asking that question. "So that you can get back together with Anna."

"Luce, I don't love Anna. I love you. And I told Anna that I don't like her as anything more than just a friend. She understands that now."

"Really?" Lucy sat down. "I want to believe you, it's just that she's..."

He sat down next to her. "Then believe me. Please?" He slowly inched his way over to her. "I'm sorry. I should have listened to you when you told me that Anna still had feelings for me. You were right, and I was stupid for not seeing it..." he stopped talking when he felt her head on his shoulder.

"This day has been horrible. How in the world did it turn out this way? This morning was great. Then we come here and everything goes wrong."

"I don't know. Maybe we can blame it on the snow?" He kissed her forehead. "So is everything forgiven?"

She looked at him and gave him a grin. "Only if you'll forgive me for being so crazy."

"Done." He replied, bringing her lips to meet his. "So what do you want to do while we're trapped in here?"

She could tell that he had something specific in mind, but she wasn't sure. "John, I don't think that's a good idea. What if the power suddenly comes back on and we get caught?"

"That just adds some excitement to it. Besides, have you ever done it in an elevator before?"

"No. You?" she asked.

"Nope." He smiled, hoping to convince her.

"I don't know..." Lucy trailed off. Then she looked at Carter, who just looked so damned irresistible. "This is probably a bad idea, but what the hell!" she exclaimed as she kissed him and started to take off his lab coat.

* * *

About an hour later, they were cuddled together when the lights came back on. "Damn!" Lucy yelled, knowing that at any minute the elevator would be moving again. They both struggled to put their clothes back on before the door opened. But soon the door opened and they were face-to-face with Dr. Greene.

Mark couldn't believe what he was seeing. Ok, so he could believe it, but he was still shocked. He got into the elevator quickly and closed the doors, pulling the stop button for the elevator. Then he turned away from both of them. "You guys better finish getting dressed. Carter, your fly's open and Lucy, your shirt is on backwards."

Lucy looked at Carter with panic in her eyes as they adjusted their clothes.

"Can I turn around now?" Mark asked, giving them a few seconds.

"Yes." Carter replied.

"I wondered where you two were all this time." Mark sighed. "I just didn't really expect this."

"Dr. Greene, this is all my fault..." Lucy started to say.

"I don't care who's fault it is Lucy. You both have broken hospital policy."

Lucy closed her eyes. This is exactly what she didn't want to happen. Who knew what Dr. Greene was going to do to them now.

Carter looked over at Lucy and saw that she was upset. He wanted to wrap his arms around her and re-assure her, but now was definitely not the right time. There was no reason to add to the trouble they were already in.

Mark paused. He pressed the start button for the elevator. "Lucy, why don't you wait in the lounge? I want to talk to you in private after I talk to Carter." 

"Ok." She said quietly, even though she wanted to stay there with Carter.

Mark closed the elevator doors again and stopped the elevator. "Carter, you've done a lot of stupid things in the past. You've broken a lot of hospital policies, but I always thought that you knew better than to do something like this with your med student." He paused, thinking about what to do now. "I'd love to be able to tell you that I won't tell anyone and that it will be our little secret, but I can't do that."

"I understand." Carter nodded.

"I'm going to have to talk to Dr. Anspaugh about this and then we'll figure out what to do from there. Right now, I'm removing you as Lucy's teacher."

"That's fair."

"So is this a one-time thing between you two?" Mark asked. Maybe if it was a one-time thing, Dr. Anspaugh would be more forgiving.

Carter looked at the floor and shook his head. "This wasn't the first time. I mean, it was the first time in the hospital, but not..."

"Ok. I get the picture." Mark interrupted. "How long has this been going on?"

"Since around Halloween."

"Halloween?" Mark exclaimed. "I can't believe this! You've been keeping it a secret for that long!"

"And we're engaged." Carter informed him.

As mad as he was for Carter and Lucy keeping their relationship a secret, he couldn't help but smile at his friend. "Well congratulations."

"Thanks." Carter smiled back.

He laughed. "I always thought you two would make a cute couple. I even bet on you two in a couple of pools going on in the ER. I'll be rooting for you guys, but I can't promise that Dr. Anspaugh will be forgiving and compassionate about this."

"I understand." Carter replied.

Mark pushed the button for the elevator to start again. "Ok. I'll try to schedule a meeting with Dr. Anspaugh for today since we're all stuck here right now." He walked out of the elevator and headed into the lounge. When he got there, he found Lucy staring vacantly out the window. She turned to face him when he came in. "Lucy, I've spoken with Carter, and he told me about your relationship."

"He has?" Lucy asked, scared out of her mind.

"Yeah. First let me tell you congratulations on the engagement." He smiled.

"Thank you Dr. Greene." She gave him a half-smile and waited for him to tell her what the punishment would be.

"With that said, I'm very sorry to tell you that it's not my job to give out punishments for things like this. If it were, I would give you and Carter the minimum punishment possible and wish you well. But Dr. Anspaugh is the one who will be deciding your fate. I'm going to go and see if he can meet with us in the next couple of hours. We'll sit down and discuss the situation and he will decide your fates." Mark explained. "Any questions?"

"Just one." Lucy replied. "What do you think Dr. Anspaugh's going to do to Carter?"

"I don't know. He could fire him, but he could also just suspend him. I guess it depends on what kind of mood he's in." Mark explained. "I'll get back to you and Carter when I've set up a meeting."

Once Mark was out of the lounge, Carter came in. he saw Lucy sitting on the couch, and she looked like she was about to cry. He sat next to her. "Everything's going to be ok."

"No it isn't." she told him. "I was afraid this would happen. Everything's going to be ruined!"

"No it won't. Everything will be fine." He stroked her face.

She pulled away. She didn't want to, but she was afraid that they would get caught again. "I need to go think—alone." She got up and walked out of the lounge. She headed to the restroom, but stopped when she heard Dave call out to her. She entered an exam room and saw Dave sitting on a stool, going over some charts. "Catching up on work?"

"Yeah. There's nothing else to do." Dave sighed. He took a good look at her, and could tell that she was upset. "I heard about Sobricki. Want to talk about it?"

"No. It bothers me that he's here and not in jail or a mental institution, but that's the least of my worries right now." She confessed.

"What's wrong?"

Lucy closed the door to the exam room and sat down on the bed. "Carter and I got stuck in an elevator, and we got caught by Mark."

"What do you mean by caught? What exactly were you doing?" He smiled wickedly. "Oh! You were..."

"We actually had just finished." She corrected him, blushing slightly. "Carter's told him about our relationship."

"So now that Mark knows about you two, what's going to happen?"

"I don't know. Mark is scheduling a meeting with Dr. Anspaugh. Anything could happen."

"I'm sorry." He sympathized.

"Carter's acting like this doesn't matter, but it's a big deal! Dr. Anspaugh could fire him, yet he's perfectly calm. I don't know how he can be so calm." She exclaimed. "I'm not calm!"

"I think it's quite simple. It makes perfect sense." Dave told her. "He loves you Lucy. I mean, before you got here, his career was the most important thing in his life. But now, you're the most important thing in his life. I know that if I was in Carter's shoes, I'd feel the same way."

She smiled and gave him a quick hug. "How'd I get lucky enough to have you be such a good friend to me?"

"Some people are just born lucky I guess." He laughed.

"Thanks for listening."

"Anytime." Dave smiled, watching her walk out of the room.

Coming out of the exam room, she ran into Carter. "Hey."

"Hey. Mark just told me that we're supposed to go meet with Dr. Anspaugh now." Carter told her as he ushered her to the elevator.

* * *

Mark stood waiting outside of Dr. Anspaugh's office. He saw Carter and Lucy approach and gave them each a small smile. "I have explained the situation to Dr. Anspaugh. Now he wants to talk to the two of you separately."

Carter exchanged a glance with Lucy. He could tell that she was still scared, but she looked a little calmer that before. "So who goes first?"

"He asked for you to come in first." Mark explained, pointing to Carter.

"Ok." Carter agreed. He gave Lucy's hand a squeeze and entered the office. "Hello Dr. Anspaugh."

"Dr. Carter." Dr. Anspaugh nodded. "Please...sit."

Carter sat down and stared at Dr. Anspaugh, expecting him to yell about how inappropriate his relationship with Lucy is.

"You do know that dating your med student is against hospital policy, don't you?"

"Yes." Carter nodded.

"And you do know that I have the right to fire you and petition the state licensing board to revoke your medical license?"

"Yes." Carter nodded again.

Dr. Anspaugh paused for a moment and sat back in his chair. "So what do you have to say in defense of yourself then?"

Carter took a quick look around the room, gathering up his thoughts and trying to form them into a coherent answer. "I know that there really isn't a good excuse to justify why Lucy and I have broken hospital policy. But I'm going to give you my excuse anyway." He paused again, wanting to make sure that he expressed his thoughts correctly. "I love her. I love Lucy, and I have for a long time. She is that one person, that soul mate, that everyone searches a lifetime for. When I'm around her, I feel complete. I'm sorry that we've broken hospital policy, but I'll never be sorry that we've been dating. This isn't just a short-term relationship for us. We plan on getting married after she graduates, and we..."

"Thank you Dr. Carter. That's enough." Dr. Anspaugh interrupted. He had heard enough. "You're free to go, but please tell Ms. Knight to come in here for a moment."

Carter was disappointed that he didn't get to talk more. He had a lot more that he could've said in their defense. But he simply nodded and left the office.

Lucy jumped up and walked over to Carter when he came out into the hallway. "How'd it go?" she asked nervously.

"Not sure yet." He shrugged his shoulders. "He wants to talk to you now."

"Ok." Lucy slowly entered the office. "Hello Dr. Anspaugh."

"Ms. Knight." He nodded. "Please, have a seat."

She did as she was told and got even more nervous as the seconds dragged on.

"Ms. Knight, before you and Dr. Carter started you're relationship, were you aware that there was a hospital policy against teachers dating their med students?"

"Yes...yes I was." Lucy replied softly.

"Then if you were aware of the policy, why did you agree to engage in a romantic relationship with Dr. Carter?" Dr. Anspaugh asked. He had heard Dr. Carter profess his love for her, and was curious about what her answer would be.

She looked down at the floor, trying to compose her thoughts so that she didn't ramble. "We developed a pretty nice friendship after the whole Sobricki incident." She paused, a smile coming to her face. "I wasn't fully aware of it at the time, but I loved him. He's quite possibly the greatest man that I've ever met. I love him, and we do want to get married. But..."

"But what, Ms. Knight?"

The smile that had graced her face slowly melted away. "The last thing I've ever wanted to do was ruin his career. He loves being a doctor; he's great at it. So I guess what I'm trying to say is that I want you to punish me. Please! Just don't fire him." She pleaded.

Dr. Anspaugh sat there in silence for a moment, taking in what Dr. Carter and Mr. Knight had just expressed to him. Finally, he made a decision about their punishment. "Ms. Knight, please go tell Dr. Greene and Dr. Carter to come back in here. I've reached my decision."  
  
**A/N: I realize this is a really bad place to end the chapter and I'm sorry about that. But it could not be avoided. I'd like to also thank everyone who has been reviewing this story!! :) **


	16. Crime and Punishment

The Lucky Ones

Chapter Sixteen

Lucy stood up and left the office, finding Mark and Carter sitting in the hallway. "He wants you two to come back inside now. He's made a decision." She reported.

Carter walked over to her. "How did it go?"

"Not sure yet." She replied. The three of them then entered the office. Lucy and Carter both sat in chairs across from Dr. Anspaugh's desk while Mark stood a few feet behind them.

Dr. Anspaugh took a deep breath before starting to speak. "I could start off by telling you both how unethical your behavior has been, or I could tell you how disappointed I am in the both of you. You should not have broken hospital policy. But instead I'd like to tell you congratulations on the engagement." He smiled.

Carter and Lucy exchanged glances of shock. "Um, thank you." Carter finally replied.

"After talking with you both, I am reminded of my past. You see I met my wife when she was a nurse at the hospital I worked at in Michigan. I was just out of med school, and new to Michigan. We started off as friends, and then we fell in love. The only problem was that, at least in that hospital, it was against policy for us doctors to date nurses. But we still dated, and even got married in secret." He paused. There had been a smile on his face as he relived those memories. But now the smile on his face was gone. "When the hospital found out that we had gotten married, we were both fired. It almost ruined my career, and hers too. I still, to this day, think that firing us was a little harsh. That's why I'm not going to fire anyone today."

Carter and Lucy smiled at each other. They could handle any punishment as long as they didn't lose their jobs.

"But that doesn't mean that I'm not going to punish you both. Just because I sympathize with your situation, it doesn't mean that I can just ignore the fact that you have broken hospital policy." Dr. Anspaugh explained.

"We understand." Lucy nodded.

"Now...as far as a punishment." Dr. Anspaugh paused. "I'm afraid that I'm going to have to suspend both of you for a week without pay."

That's not too bad. Lucy nodded her head. "I think that's fair."

"Yes, it's definitely more than fair." Carter nodded. He was expecting more than just a week's suspension without pay.

"That's not all though. We still have to deal with the fact that you, Dr. Carter, have been acting as Ms. Knight's teacher. I think it's fairly obvious that Ms. Knight can not remain your student anymore." He looked over at Dr. Greene, who up until now had been merely observing the meeting. "Dr. Greene, you have volunteered to take over as Ms. Knight's teacher until graduation?"

"That's right." Mark agreed.

Dr. Anspaugh nodded. "I think that's a good idea. The last thing we need is another public scandal. That's why I think it would be best if you two still keep your relationship a secret until Ms. Knight's graduation. I think it would be best if you both worked as many separate shifts as possible. I don't want a repeat of what happened today in the elevator."

Lucy knew that Dr. Anspaugh was being very kind in their punishment, but she still didn't like the idea of working opposite shift with Carter. She'd hardly ever see him if they worked separate shifts!

Carter wasn't too thrilled about being forced to work shifts opposite to Lucy, but realized that it was a small price to pay for not getting fired. Besides, they had that one week suspension. Maybe they could go up to his grandparents' cabin and spend some quality time together before their opposite shifts started.

"Once Ms. Knight has graduated, you two can go back to working as many or as few shifts together as you want. But I think it would be best to limit the amount that you two work together right now." He paused for a moment. "That is all."

"Thank you very much." Carter told him, standing up.

Lucy stood up too. "Yes, thank you Dr. Anspaugh. We really appreciate this."

Dr. Anspaugh smiled again. "So do you appreciate it enough to invite me to the wedding? Because I love a good wedding!"

Carter and Lucy both chuckled. "You will definitely be invited to the wedding." Lucy smiled.

"Come on. Let's go and let Dr. Anspaugh get back to work." Mark commented, ushering Carter and Lucy out of the office. "You two were very lucky in there."

Carter exchanged a smile with Lucy. "Yeah. We are lucky."

"I should go and check on the ER and make sure that it's still there." Mark excused himself.

So Carter and Lucy were alone again. They started walking. "So I was thinking that tomorrow I would call my grandparents. Hopefully, their cabin won't be occupied." Carter told her.

Her eyes got bright. "You want to go away for the week?"

"Yeah. We're suspended, so they won't be calling us in unless something absolutely catastrophic happens." He explained. "So what do you think? The cabin's in the woods and is pretty isolated."

"We could be completely isolated and alone for a few days?" She looked at him wickedly. "Count me in!"

"Great. I'll call them tomorrow. I'm sure they won't mind."

"Sounds good." She smiled.

* * *

Since the whole hospital was on lock down because of the blizzard, it only took short time for the rumors about Lucy and Carter to circulate around. Everyone working in the ER had heard rumors about the alleged elevator incident and they were all speculating on what had actually happened. Lucy walked up to the front desk and stretched out her neck.

Chuni, Jerry, and Dave all looked at each other before looking at Lucy and laughing.

"What?" Lucy asked, not understanding why they were laughing at her. "Do I have something on my face?"

"What exactly were you and Carter doing while you were trapped in the elevator together? Playing a game of some sort?" Chuni asked.

Lucy took a deep breath. The last thing she wanted to deal with right now was gossip. "Oh come on! Honestly! I realize that you guys have nothing else better to do right now than gossip about a possible relationship between Carter and myself. But you have it all wrong."

"Yeah. C'mon guys. There's also that rumor about Carter and Anna." Jerry replied.

"No way they're both true! There's no way that a guy like Carter could have two women and poor old Dave over here doesn't even have one." Dave laughed. Even though he knew the truth about Lucy and Carter's relationship, he always enjoyed pretending like he didn't know anything.

"I don't know. I don't believe the Carter and Anna one as much as I believe the Carter and Lucy one." Chuni replied.

"Well, wanna put your money where your mouth is?" Jerry asked.

"Yeah, I do. I'll bet you that Carter and Lucy have gotten together. And if they haven't gotten together yet, I bet that they will get together soon." Chuni replied.

Lucy watched the scene play out in front of her. "Hello? Did you all forget that I'm standing right here?" She yelled over them.

"Oh, I'm sorry Lucy. Would you like to place a bet too?" Jerry laughed.

"Agh! You all are impossible!" Lucy grunted, walking away from the desk.

"Anyway," Jerry continued, "I bet that Carter and Anna get together."

"I want in on this bet too." Dave replied. Since he knew the truth about Lucy and Carter's relationship, this was easy money. "Put me down for Carter with Lucy."

Lucy entered exam room six and saw Carter doing paperwork. "There's a new pool forming right now." She told him.

"What's it about now?" Carter asked, looking up from his paperwork.

"You."

"Me? What are you talking about?" he asked.

"It's a new pool about who you're going to hook up with. Jerry thinks that you're going to hook up with Anna, while Chuni is saying that we're together."

"Well, for once, Chuni is actually smart about where she puts his money on these pools." He smiled and pulled her down so that she was sitting on his lap. He started kissing her neck.

"We really shouldn't be doing this. For one, we're in exam six. We don't have a very good track record in this room. Two, the doors aren't locked. And three, we don't want to tempt fate. Dr. Greene already found us earlier. I don't think he'll be too happy to see us together again." Lucy reminded him.

"Yeah, you're probably right." Carter sighed.

Lucy got up from sitting on his lap and yawned.

"Tired?"

"Yes. Between our little elevator ride and everything else, I am tired. You wore me out in the elevator!" she playfully hit his arm. "You have a tendency to exhaust me."

"Sorry." He said sarcastically.

"Don't be. I'm not." She leaned in for a quick kiss. "I better go, but I'll see you later." She left the exam room and saw Chuni eying her suspiciously from the front desk. "It's nothing Chuni!" she yelled.

* * *

About seven hours later, the snowstorm still hadn't let up and there was nothing to do in the ER. So Chuni, Jerry, Dave, Lucy, Carter, and Anna were all playing poker in the lounge. They had been playing for about three hours. "You know what? I'm out. I can't play anymore. Especially with you, Dave." Carter sighed, throwing his cards into the middle of the table.

"What? What did I do?" Dave asked, playing innocent.

Lucy, who was sitting across from Carter, spoke up. "You've been cheating this whole time."

"I have not!" Dave protested, even though he had been trying to cheat.

"Yes you have!" Carter and Lucy said at the same time. This caused Chuni to look at Lucy suspiciously again.

Anna stood up. She couldn't stand playing any more poker. "This has been fun, but I'm gonna go catch some sleep in an empty exam room. Wake me if the storm breaks and we can leave."

Carter saw Lucy yawn again. "Luce, you really should go get some sleep too. You've been yawning throughout the whole game." He advised.

"Yeah, maybe you're right." Lucy agreed. She saw Chuni looking at her suspiciously again and rolled her eyes.

Once she was gone, Carter turned to remaining people at the table. "I know that you have another pool going about me."

"What pool?" Jerry asked, trying to sound like he was innocent.

"The pool about whether I'm going to hook up with Lucy or Anna." Carter explained.

"Who told you about this supposed pool?" Chuni asked, now looking at Carter suspiciously. She figured it must have been Lucy.

"I have my ways of finding out." Carter replied. "Look, my point is this. My personal life is none of your business."

"But you and Lucy are always together. You come in together, you take your breaks together, you leave together, and you're practically joined at the hip." Chuni pointed out.

"We're just good friends." Carter lied.

"Well we heard that you and Lucy got a little physical in the elevator today." Chuni mentioned.

"Nothing happened in the elevator." Carter lied.

"And what about the rumor that you and Anna are going to get back together?" Jerry asked.

"Nothing's happening with me and Anna either." Carter explained.

"So we're supposed to believe that both rumors are false?" Jerry asked.

"You can believe whatever you want. That's the great thing about being in America. But the truth is that nothing happened." Carter replied, standing up. "Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go take a nap."

"Will you be joining Lucy or Anna?" Chuni called out.

"Ha ha! You're really funny Chuni!" Carter cried out as he left the lounge.

Once he was gone, Chuni looked over at Dave and Jerry. "He's definitely hiding something."  
  
**  
A/N: Sorry for the delay in getting this chapter out. It's been a very busy week. But thank you for all of the kind reviews. Please check out my new story, We Used To Be Friends. It's another Carcy story. I'm still going to be writing this story though, so don't worry. I just had another story idea that I needed to explore. **


	17. Free To Go

The Lucky Ones

Chapter Seventeen

A couple of hours later, Lucy stood at a window, looking at how much snow had fallen. There were only a couple of inches of the window that wasn't bombarded with snow. Standing there, she started to reflect upon the day's events. Seeing Paul Sobricki had shaken her up more than she really wanted to let people know. He was her least favorite person on the planet and wondered why he wasn't being held in prison or at least a mental institution. Pushing thoughts of him out of her mind, she decided to focus on how lucky she and Carter had been with Dr. Anspaugh. He could have really destroyed their careers, but instead, let them go without a serious punishment. Sure, they wouldn't be able to see each other as much, but maybe that would be a good thing. With her free time, she could start planning their wedding. She smiled as she thought about their wedding. She couldn't wait until she could become Mrs. Carter. Just the thought of being able to call herself his wife gave her goose bumps on her arms. She loved him, and she couldn't wait until they started their life together as a married couple. She heard someone approach her and was surprised to find Anna.

"Still snowing?" Anna asked.

"Yep. Feels like we'll never get out of here." Lucy replied. She turned to walk away.

"Um, Lucy? Can I talk to you for a minute?" Anna called out, causing Lucy to turn back around.

"Sure." Lucy finally replied.

"I just wanted to apologize for what happened in curtain two earlier. I swear if I had known, I would've made the EMT's take him to another hospital."

Lucy looked at Anna and could tell that she was being sincere. "Hey, it's not your fault. How were you supposed to know?"

"So we're ok?" Anna asked, hesitantly.

"What do you mean?"

"Well I get the impression that you don't like me very much." Anna replied.

That's because I don't! I think you're after my fiancé! Somehow she managed to not show her true feelings. "It's not that I don't like you. I just don't really know you very well." Lucy replied.

"Oh. Well, maybe we could go grab some coffee and get to know one another a little better?" she suggested. She had a feeling that the reason Carter didn't want to rekindle their relationship was because he was seeing Lucy. Maybe if she became friends with Lucy, she could find out for certain and then break them up.

Lucy thought about it for a moment. "Sounds good." She accepted because this was the perfect way to snoop around about just how deep Anna's feelings for Carter were since Anna didn't know about her relationship with Carter.

* * *

Carter walked up to the front desk and saw Chuni flipping through a magazine. "Hey have you seen..."

"Your harem went off to the cafeteria together about a half-hour ago." Chuni replied.

"My harem?" Carter asked, confused by that statement.

"Yeah. Lucy and Anna. Your harem!" Chuni reminded him.

"They are not my harem!" he yelled as he headed into the lounge. Once in the lounge, he saw that Dave was reading the newspaper. He sat down next to him and picked up the sports page.

* * *

"I'm glad that we had this time to talk." Anna smiled at Lucy as they walked back down to the ER. She hadn't been able to find out if Lucy was dating Carter, but realized that it would take time before Lucy trusted her enough to tell her something like that.

"Me too." Lucy replied. As much as it pained her to admit, Anna actually seemed like a pretty nice person. Things would be a lot easier if Anna was this horrible person that no one liked. But that wasn't the case, and she would just have to trust that her relationship with John was strong enough and that he loved only her. They entered the lounge and saw Dave and Carter arguing.

"You're wrong! You're so wrong about this!" Dave yelled.

"No you're the one who's mistaken!" Carter yelled back.

Lucy and Anna looked back at each other and shrugged. "Excuse me, but what are you two arguing about? Maybe we can help." Lucy suggested.

"Carter over here thinks that the second Godfather movie was the best one of the trilogy." Dave laughed.

"And Dave over there thinks that the first one was the best." Carter pointed.

"Well I have to agree with Carter on this one. The second one was the best. The acting and plot were far more superior than the first one." Lucy replied.

"But the first one set everything up!" Anna objected, siding with Dave. "The first one was brilliant! And who can forget that awesome scene where Sonny gets shot a million times at the tollbooth?"

They all started arguing about which movie was better, when Mark entered. He whistled to get everyone's attention. "Excuse me! What is going on in here?" he yelled. "I can hear all of you yelling all the way down the hall!"

"Uh, we arguing about which movie is better." Dave pointed to himself and Anna. "We think it was the first Godfather movie and Carter and Lucy think it's the second one."

"That's what you've been yelling about?" Mark asked, starting to laugh. "Which Godfather movie is better?"

"Yeah." Carter replied.

"Well, that's not even a contest. Everyone knows that the second one is the best." Mark replied, getting something out of his locker. He shook his head as he left the lounge.

"See?" Carter and Lucy said at the same time.

Dave laughed. "You guys have got to quit doing that."

"What?" Carter and Lucy asked in unison.

"That!" Dave replied. "Saying the same thing at the same time! It's weird and creepy! It's like you guys share a brain."

"We do not share a brain!" They said together. Then they smiled at each other and started laughing.

"Ok, maybe we do talk in unison a lot." Lucy giggled.

"Hey, you know what they say. Great minds think alike." Anna told Dave. She turned to face him. "Can I talk to you for a minute?" Dave seemed like he was a close friend of Lucy's. Maybe he could tell her about how deep Carter and Lucy's relationship was.

"Sure." Dave replied, leaving the lounge with Anna.

"What do you think that's about?" Carter asked, referring to Anna going off with Dave.

"Don't know, and don't really care." She replied, sitting next to him.

"So, I heard a rumor that you and Anna went to get coffee together."

"Do you always listen to rumors?" Lucy asked with a chuckle.

"Only sometimes."

"Well this one was right. We got coffee and actually had a nice conversation. Maybe she's not Satan, like I originally thought." Lucy laughed.

"Well I'm glad that you guys could get along." Carter replied, giving her a quick kiss.

"I want to apologize again for acting a little crazy lately."

"Only a little?" Carter teased.

Lucy playfully hit his arm. "It's just that I don't know what I'd do if I ever lost you and I just feel like I'm on an emotional roller coaster right now."

"I know. I've been feeling the same way. But you'll never lose me." He replied. "Cause I don't ever plan on leaving your side."

After sitting there in silence for a few minutes, Lucy spoke again. "So, we still haven't talked about seeing him today."

"No we haven't." The smile that was on his face quickly faded as the topic of Sobricki was brought up.

"Do you want to talk about it?" Lucy asked, hesitantly. She didn't want to talk about it, but knew that they needed to.

"Right now?"

"Well we are alone right now, and the longer we put off, the more we won't want to." She reasoned.

He paused for a moment. "I just don't understand what he's doing out living his life like nothing happened. He...he almost killed you, but he's not paying for it! He's out roaming the streets and living his life!"

"He almost killed you too." Lucy reminded him softly, as she grabbed a hold of his hand.

"I know, and I'll always be mad at him for that. Every time my back hurts, I curse him. But you...I'm furious with him about what he did to you. There are still times that I enter an exam room here and I see you lying on the floor in that pool of blood. I hate him, and I'll hate him for the rest of my life." As he concluded his statement of hate, a single tear cascaded from his eye.

Lucy quickly wiped it away and put her arm around his shoulder, not caring if anyone walked in and saw them sitting like that. "I hate him too." She whispered. "I thought that I was finally ok. I mean, I've had therapy, and I thought that I was past it; that I had gotten some kind of closure or something. But seeing him today, brought everything back again."

"We'll never be completely free of him, will we?" he asked, looking into her eyes.

She sadly shook her head. "Probably not. But I don't think our lives have to be defined by him and what happened. It's in the past, and we can't change the past. We can change the future though. We don't need to let him control our future." They sat there for another twenty minutes before going back out and joining everyone at the front desk.

* * *

About an hour later, Carter looked around and couldn't find Lucy. Everyone had been standing around the front desk talking, but now Lucy was nowhere to be found. After a few seconds of thought, he immediately knew where she had gone.

Lucy walked down the hallway and stopped when she got to the security guard in front of the door.

"Excuse me Miss, but you can't go in there. No one except his doctor and his nurse can go in there." The guard smiled. He knew who she was, and for a second, tried to figure out why she would ever want to go inside.

Lucy smiled a little. "Your name is Steve, right? You come down to the ER a lot to take care of disturbances?"

"Yes Miss."

"Then you probably know who I am, right?"

"Yes Miss Knight." Steve replied.

"I'd like to go in."

"I don't think that's a very good idea."

Lucy looked in the room. "I see the patient is in restraints and you're right outside the door. It should be fairly safe to go in for a few minutes."

"I'm very sorry. But my instructions were not to let anyone in."

"Please?" Lucy asked nicely. "If you know who I am, then you should know why I feel the need to go in there. I just need a few minutes."

Steve debated it for a minute. "Alright, but only five minutes. After that, I'm coming in there and dragging you out if I have to."

"Thank you." She smiled. She hesitated before entering the room, as if trying to decide whether or not this was a good idea. Giving herself a short mental pep talk, she walked into the room, staying a good five feet away from the bed.

Paul looked over and saw Lucy standing there. "I didn't expect to see you here." He said after a few moments of silence.

"I didn't expect to come here." Lucy finally replied. "I wanted you to know something. I'm not a vengeful person. I've never hated anyone in my entire life--until I met you. I'll never forgive you for what you did to me or to Dr. Carter. The fact that you have a mental disorder is no excuse for the pain that you caused us both...that you caused our family and friends." She almost started crying, but held herself together. "And as much as I hate you for what you did, I do genuinely hope that you get better and stay on whatever medication that you are on, just for the fact that I don't want you to go around and do this to another person." She lifted up her shirt to show the scars along her stomach that she would have for the rest of her life. "Like I said, I'm not a vengeful person. But if I ever hear that you've gone off your medication and hurt someone else, I won't hesitate to hunt you down like an animal and carve into you like you carved into me. Understand?"

"She won't be the only one hunting you down." A voice said from the doorway.

Lucy turned to see John coming into the room. He walked over and held her hand.

"I'll be right there with her." Carter continued. "Understand?"

"Y-y-yes." Paul stuttered.

"C'mon, let's go." Carter whispered into Lucy's ear, leading her out the door. Once they were in the elevator, he gave her a hug. "You had me worried when I realized where you had gone."

"You aren't mad that I went in there?" Lucy asked, figuring that he would be furious with her. That was why she hadn't told him she was going.

"I wasn't thrilled that you went in there alone. But I trust your judgment." He replied. "I know that you needed to do that."

"Thanks." She smiled, letting go of him since the elevator ride was almost over. "I love you John."

"I love you too Luce." He replied as they walked out of the elevator. "The good news is that the roads are starting to open up now. We're free to go."

"That's good, because it's been a long day." Lucy sighed.

"Yes it has." He agreed.


	18. Cabin Vacation

The Lucky Ones

Chapter Eighteen

**A/N: Sorry for the delay in getting this chapter posted. I wanted to make it as perfect as I possibly could, and I'm pretty happy with the end result now. I have always had a very long story planned out, but I've decided to end this story arc right here. So this chapter is the culmination of the first story arc. In a few days I'll start the sequel to this story. I haven't settled on a title yet though, but I plan on posting it in a few days. So please be on the look out for that. All in all, I think that this will end up being a trilogy. I really want to give out a huge thank you to everyone who has been reviewing this story. The reviews have really encouraged and motivated me. So thank you very much, and I hope that everyone continues to read the sequel!**

_My dear, it's time to say I thank god for you.   
I thank god for you in each and every single way.   
And, I know... I know... I know... I know...   
It's time to let you know... time to let you know.   
Time to let you know... time to sit here and say:   
I know we are... we are the lucky ones._

The next day, Carter called his grandparents and found out that no one was using the cabin. They were more than happy to let Carter take Lucy there for the week. So, after Carter and Lucy spent some quality time in bed together, they finally started their road trip to the cabin. About an hour and a half later, Carter pulled up into the driveway of the cabin and turned off the engine. Then he looked over at Lucy. "We're here." He announced with a smile on his face.

Lucy smiled back and then looked at the cabin. It was dark, but the moon was full so she could see the outline of the snow-covered cabin. "It looks wonderful."

"It will look even better tomorrow when the sun is out. I'll get the luggage if you get the groceries." Carter suggested, getting out of the jeep.

"Ok." Lucy replied. They had stopped at a grocery store on their way so that they wouldn't have to leave to get food. This way, they could spend all of their time locked away in the cabin. She took the bags and followed Carter to the door.

Carter opened the door and let Lucy enter first. He watched her with interest as she appeared to be spell bound with the cabin.

Lucy looked around the cabin. From the outside, it looked small. But now that she was inside, it was enormous and very well decorated. But then again, it was a Carter family property so what else did she expect?

"Like it?" Carter asked, drawing her out of her mesmerized state.

"Love it." She replied, remembering that she had food in her hands. "I'm going to go put the food away before it spoils."

He pointed off to her left. "Kitchen's that way. I'll go put the bags in the bedroom."

Lucy walked into the kitchen and was impressed by the fancy refrigerator that they had. She quickly put the food in the refrigerator and then proceeded to put the rest of the food into the empty cabinets. A few minutes later, she found that a pair of arms had wrapped around her waist. She turned to face him and wrapped her arms around his neck. "This place is great."

"I'm glad you think so. I've had some good memories here, and I'm really looking forward to making more good memories here with you." He removed her arms from where they were resting around his neck and grabbed a hold of her hands. Then he brought her hands up to his mouth, gently kissing them.

Lucy closed the already small gap between them and started kissing him. "I never want this feeling to end." She whispered.

"What feeling?" Carter asked in between kisses.

"This feeling of pure happiness that I get by just being around you. I feel so safe and loved, and I never want it to end." Lucy replied.

"I won't. I promise."

Lucy kissed him again. "Hmm, you can't really promise that. What if something happens?"

He stopped kissing her and looked at her. "I love you Lucy. I always will. Even if something did happen, I could never stop loving you."

"I could never stop loving you either." She laid a simple kiss on his lips.

He looked over at the clock on the microwave. "It's getting kinda late. I'm ready for bed. Are you?"

She looked over and saw that it was only 9. "Do you always consider nine 'o' clock as being late?" She asked, jokingly.

"Well not always." Carter grinned. "Just when I have the opportunity to have such a fine woman like yourself sleeping with me."

She giggled at his choice of words. "The opportunity? Well I'm glad you see that it isn't a basic human right."

"I'd never assume it was." He chuckled.

"Good!" Lucy smiled, grabbing a hold of his arm. "So, care to lead me to the bedroom?"

"It would be my pleasure."

* * *

The next morning, Carter woke up and found Lucy sleeping in her normal position—snuggled up close to him with her head on his chest. He gently kissed her head and took a long look at her. He always loved it when he woke up before her. It gave him a chance to stare at her while she slept, and he enjoyed that. She usually has the silliest grin on her face while she's sleeping. It makes him wonder what her dreams are like. 

Lucy slowly opened her eyes and squinted as they adjusted to the rays of sunlight that were escaping through the drapes. She snuggled up close to Carter, not aware of the fact that he was already awake and watching her.

"Good morning." He whispered into her ear.

She looked up and smiled. "How long have you been awake?"

"Not long." He answered truthfully. "I was just watching you sleep."

"Really?" She asked. "Why would you do that?"

"Because you get this really cute grin on your face when you're sleeping. I don't know what you're dreaming about, but I can only guess that it's something good."

She chuckled. "Well my dream last night was very good."

"Wanna share it?" He asked.

"Sure." She replied as she turned to face him. "We were in a beautiful church with all of our family and friends...and they were all smiling at us while we were getting married."

"Hmm, that does sound like a good dream." He wrapped his arm around her. "In a couple of months, we'll make that dream will come true."

"I know." Lucy nodded. "Because you make all of my dreams come true."

He leaned down and kissed her. "I'm hungry. Let's go make breakfast."

"Ok." Lucy agreed. "But let me make the breakfast. I want our food to actually be edible!"

"Ouch!" Carter exclaimed. "That comment hurt."

She tried stifling a laugh. "Sorry, but we both know that you can't cook. So why don't you just make the coffee?"

"Fine." He replied, pretending that he was hurt by her comment.

* * *

Later that day, Carter was outside trying to gather up some pre-cut firewood from the shed behind the cabin. He thought that Lucy was inside. That's why he was surprised when he felt a snowball hit the back of his head. He turned around and saw Lucy standing a few feet away from him with an innocent look on her face. "Did you just throw a snowball at me?" 

"No. I don't know who did that, but it wasn't me." Lucy lied.

He grinned, knowing that she was lying. "Who else could have done it? We're the only ones here."

She shrugged her shoulders. "I don't know. Sorry, but I didn't see it."

He nodded. "Ok." He quickly bent down and grabbed a bunch of snow, forming it into a ball and throwing it directly at Lucy.

Lucy felt the snowball hit her arm and put her hands on her waist. "Hey! You know that this means war, right?" Her tone was strict, but also playful.

"Bring it on!" Carter exclaimed. They each grabbed handfuls of snow and started hurling snowballs at each other. He was finding it hard to hit Lucy. She was surprisingly fast and most of his snowballs ended up hitting the ground instead of her.

Lucy threw a huge snowball at him and then ducked behind a tree when he threw one back at her. Going back onto the offensive, she picked up more snow and hurled it directly into his face. "Ha!" she laughed.

"Ok. You're asking for it now! I was being nice to you, but now that's over." Carter replied, gathering up enough snow for a huge snowball. "No more Mr. Nice Guy. It's no holds bar now."

Lucy just stood there listening to him. "Oh quit your talking and start throwing!" She taunted, dodging his latest snowball effort. She bent down and grabbed another fistful of snow, but was surprised when she felt a snowball hit her. She looked up and saw Carter standing in front of her with another snowball.

"Give up yet?" He asked with a grin on his face. He was pretty proud of himself for finally being able to hit her with a snowball. God knows that she had hit him with dozens of snowballs.

"Silly rabbit!" Lucy laughed. "Don't you know by now? I don't give up! I just get even." She knocked the snowball out of his hand and threw another snowball at him. Then she ran off to go behind the shed.

He ran after her. "So your new approach is to run away? That's original!" He called out as he followed where she had gone. But he didn't get a reply. "Lucy! Where are you?" He was starting to get worried that she wasn't answering him as he approached the outside corner of the shed

Lucy appeared from the other side of the corner and pushed him to the ground. Together they fell to the ground and she laughed. "Here I am!"

He laughed as she straddled him.

She showed him the snowball in her hand. "Ready to give up now?" She asked with a twinkle in her eye.

"No, not yet. I still have a secret weapon." He grinned.

"Oh really?" Lucy asked, intrigued by his statement. "Ok. What is this secret weapon you supposedly have?"

"It's very simple, and it goes a little something like this..." He pulled her down for a deep, passionate kiss. As she was relaxing in his grasp, he took the snowball from her hand. Then he moved her so that their positions were flipped and he was the one now pinning her to the ground. Pulling away from the kiss, he smiled.

Lucy looked around and realized that she had been bested. "That sure was sneaky."

"I told you that I'd play dirty to win."

"Yeah, I guess." She sighed. "But why don't we just call it a tie?"

"But I won!" He pouted.

"Actually, I think we both can win." She smiled, pulling him down for another steamy kiss.

* * *

After realizing that it was too cold to make-out in the snow, Carter and Lucy soon came back into the cabin to warm up. They were curled up together on the couch under a blanket and were drinking hot chocolate. "Want a marshmallow?" Lucy offered as she put another one in her hot chocolate. 

"No thanks. I'm fine." Carter replied.

"Ok. That just means more for me!" she smiled, taking one out of the bag and placing it into her mouth.

"You were pretty hard to catch out there. Did you get into a lot of snowball fights growing up?" Carter asked.

"Well not a whole lot. I was more the sledding type. I actually tried to stay away from snowball fights, but the boys in my neighborhood always thought it was funny to hit me when I wasn't looking." She explained.

"So that's how you became so good at dodging snowballs." He guessed.

"Yep." She nodded. "So what about you?"

"Are you kidding?" He laughed. "It wasn't proper for a Carter to engage in a snowball fight, but I did manage to get into a couple of really good snowball fights."

Lucy looked down and saw that she had eaten almost half of the bag of marshmallows. She quickly put it on the coffee table. "I better stop eating those. The last thing I want is to be a fat bride."

"You're not fat. You're perfect." Carter re-assured her.

"Perfect huh?" She chuckled, looking over at him. "Well I doubt that I'm perfect, but I know that I'm not fat. I will be if I continue to eat everything I see though."

He grinned wickedly. "You know, if you're so worried about your calorie intake, we could always go and do some bedroom exercises."

She couldn't contain her laughter. She couldn't believe that he had said that. "Bedroom exercises?"

"Yeah, you know..."

"Oh I know what they are!" Lucy laughed harder. "I'm just wondering, do you actually sit around and think about different ways to get me into the bedroom or do they just magically pop into your head? Cause every time you seem to approach me in a different way."

He laughed. "No, they just pop into my head. Scary, isn't it?"

"Very." She replied, leaning over and giving him a kiss.

"What was that for?" He asked.

"For being in my life. Not everyone has what we have, and I'm grateful that I have you." She explained.

He kissed her. "I'm grateful too. I thank God every night that you're in my life and we're together. You're right that not everyone has what we have. That's what makes up the lucky ones."

"Yes, we are." She agreed. "A lot of things could have kept us apart, but they didn't."

He knew that was true. "And nothing ever will keep us apart." He promised with a smile.

She kissed him again. "So can we go try some of those bedroom exercises you were talking about?"

"Absolutely!" He grinned. He grabbed a hold of her arm and led her back to the bedroom.

_Song Lyric: "Lucky" By: Bif Naked_


End file.
